The Appleway Bridge, also known as the Old I-90 Bridge, spanned the Spokane River near Stateline, Idaho, on the Washington side of the Idaho-Washington border. It was built in 1939. The Appleway Bridge served as the main east-west route between Spokane and Coeur dAlene for about 38 years. The route became known as US 10, and then, when the federal interstate highway system was established, it was used as part of Interstate 90 in the years before a restricted access freeway was completed over that stretch of the route. It is still sometimes referred to as the Old I-90 Bridge. The freeway, on a route that crosses the river just south of the Appleway route, was completed in 1977. This new stretch of I-90 included two modern bridges, one for each direction of travel. The bridges and freeway were dedicated on July 28, 1977, immediately rendering the Appleway Bridge a secondary route with far less traffic than before. It was subsequently turned over to Spokane County. The Appleway Bridge was used for the next 20 years for local traffic. In January 2007, county engineers discovered that the bridge had deteriorated badly. One of the metal hinge brackets between deck sections was cracked, which prevented the bridge from flexing when expanding and contracting. Concrete work had also deteriorated and pier sections had been undermined. County engineers immediately imposed weight restrictions on the bridge and narrowed it from four lanes to two lanes (which were each 11 feet wide with two-foot shoulders). Engineers were especially concerned because the nearby Harvard Bridge, built to roughly the same design, had failed in 1992.
Posted on: Sat, 25 Oct 2014 18:03:13 +0000