Bessemer and Lake Erie Railroad Bridge (Allegheny River)

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The Bessemer & Lake Erie Railroad Bridge is a truss bridge that carries the Canadian National Railway's Bessemer and Lake Erie Railroad division across the Allegheny River between the Pittsburgh suburbs of Plum and Harmar Township, Pennsylvania. In 1897, a single-track trestle and viaduct was built on this site; in 1918, the original piers were doubled in width, the current double-tracked structure built alongside, and then slid into place.^{[citation needed]} The original north trestle approach was buried in slag dumped from an adjacent temporary filling trestle.^[2]

Bessemer & Lake Erie Railroad Bridge

Coordinates	40°32′15″N 79°49′15″W / 40.5376°N 79.8209°W
Carries	Canadian National Railway Bessemer and Lake Erie Railroad division
Crosses	Allegheny River
Locale	Plum, Pennsylvania and Harmar Township, Pennsylvania
Characteristics
Design	Truss bridge
Total length	2,327 feet (709 m)
Longest span	520 feet (160 m)^[1]
Clearance below	89 feet (27 m)
History
Opened	1918
Location

^ Movable and Long-Span Steel Bridges 1943
^ Spivey, Justin M. (April 2000). "Bessemer & Lake Erie Railroad, Allegheny River Bridge" (PDF). Historic American Engineering Record. Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress. p. 3. Archived from the original (PDF) on February 3, 2014. Retrieved February 1, 2014.