Getting Ready The Bridges

Massive Structures of Iron Being Erected at Freight Yards

---

FIVE WILL BE USED

In Grade Separation -- Almost Ready to Put Up the First at Felch Street

---

The work of grade separation on the Ann Arbor road is progressing rapidly to the point where the bridges can be put in and workmen are busy at the yards on E. Madison street, getting these in shape.

The bridges are five in number and are of iron, three of them being what are known as "buckle plate" and the others as "open beam." In the buckle plate bridge the bottom of the bridge is covered with iron plates and pedestrians will be thus protected from cinders, coal or other dirt and refuse that might otherwise drop through from the trains as they pass, while in the "open beam" bridges there is no such protection.

These bridges all came to Ann Arbor in "knock down" condition, with each piece so lettered and numbered that the workmen have no trouble whatever in telling to which it belongs. These parts are assembled and placed in position and riveted together just as would be done if they were being built up on their permanent abutments. After the completion of a bridge and when the trackmen are ready for it, it is placed upon flat-cars by the aid of a powerful crane and the cars shoved to the point for which the bridge is intended. Here the crane is again brought into requisition, the bridge lifted up, the cars pulled from under it and the bridge lowered into position and the track laid over it.

This looks easy in the telling of it, but in actual doing it is a hard job and men of strong arm, steel nerves, and quick judgment are employed in the work. Every calculation is made to have the job done expeditiously and accurately and the merest slip is not only liable to make trouble for the workmen, but too often causes loss of life. In fact, it is said by those who keep track of such things that seldom if ever is a big job, like the one now in process on the Ann Arbor, completed without the loss of a life or the maiming of some one of the workmen.

The bridge at Felch street will be the first placed in position and it is expected that no more than a week or more will elapse before it is put up.