At around 12:00 pm today, workers used a crane to lower the first of two new bridges into place along Lake Fayetteville Trail just south of the Botanical Garden of the Ozarks. The bridge extends 35 feet over a small creek and connects to a new, 1.6-mile trailway just south of the garden’s parking lot alongside Highway 265.
This new phase connects to an existing 2.7-mile section to create a total of 4.3 miles of paved trail surrounding the lake.
A crane lowers the bridge into place
The second bridge will cross Clear Creek and will be the longest single-span trail bridge in Fayetteville at 140 feet long. Because of the length of this bridge, it will be delivered in two sections and bolted together on site. Trails Coordinator Matt Mihalevich was there this afternoon and said installation of the second bridge will begin at 8:00 am tomorrow, Tuesday, Dec. 2.
The bridges have been fabricated from weathering steel (also known as COR-TEN). This type of steel alloy is designed to rust on the outside while forming a protective layer that will never require painting or maintenance of any kind
Once installed, the new bridges will have a concrete deck and approaches poured to tie them to the rest of the trail. The new phase of trail is expected to be complete and open to the public by January 2010.
The map below shows the exact location of the new bridges. For larger photos of the installation, visit our Flickr page.
