Hillsgrove Covered Bridge

The Hillsgrove Covered Bridge is a Burr arch truss covered bridge over Loyalsock Creek in Hillsgrove Township, Sullivan County in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. It was built circa 1850 and is 186 feet (57 m) long. In 1973, it became the first covered bridge in the county to be placed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). The bridge is named for the township and nearby unincorporated village of Hillsgrove, and is also known as Rinkers Covered Bridge for an adjoining farm.

Pennsylvania had the first covered bridge in the United States, and has had the most such bridges since the 19th century. They were a transition between stone and metal bridges, with the roof and sides protecting the wooden structure from the weather. The Hillsgrove bridge has load-bearing Burr arches sandwiching multiple vertical king posts on each side, for strength and rigidity. It was built by Sadler Rodgers, who also constructed the nearby Forksville Covered Bridge in the same year, with a similar design.

The Hillsgrove bridge is the longest of three covered bridges remaining in Sullivan County, and served as a landing site for lumber rafts on the creek between 1870 and 1890. Nineteenth-century regulations restricting speed, number of animals, and fire are still posted on the bridge. Restoration work was carried out in 1963, 1968 and 2001, and the bridge is still in use, with average daily traffic of 54 vehicles in 2006. Despite these restorations, as of 2006 the National Bridge Inventory found it to be "Functionally Obsolete", with problematic foundations and railings, and a 16.5 percent structural sufficiency rating.

Read more about Hillsgrove Covered Bridge:  Overview, Bridge Dimensions

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