A historic landmark destroyed in 2003 will be revived for the
public with a new design that will leave the rubble where it
lies.

The design for a two-phase improvement project at the Kinzua
Bridge State Park will focus on the history and destruction of the
Kinzua Bridge. The 2,053-foot long railroad bridge completed in
1882, had 11 towers in the center of the bridge blow down during a
Category F-1 tornado on July 21, 2003.

“In most of our facilities, we try to tie in the visitor’s
program and education program,” said Eugene Comoss, chief engineer
with the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.
“We try to use the importance that piece of land has. In this case,
the railroad and industry are parts of the area and the main reason
the bridge was built. It’s nice to tell the history, construction,
use and destruction of the bridge.”

Comoss said the idea for the project formed just as soon as the
bridge was destroyed.

“Immediately after the tornado hit, we had a sense that we
wanted to do something that made the park viable and keep it as a
tourist attraction for the area,” Comoss said. “We wanted to keep
(the remaining towers) standing and allow people to walk out, get
out to the edge of the deck and look 300 feet down in the
valley.”

The HRG engineering firm of Harrisburg is designing the project,
which will include the construction of an observation deck on top
of the standing six steel towers of the bridge on the southeast
park side of the Kinzua Creek valley. There are also three towers
standing on the opposite side, but Comoss did not indicate that
much is in the project design for these towers.

Comoss said during the first phase of the project, they would do
structural repair to the remaining towers and their foundations as
well as the construction of the observation deck. He also said
there’s going to be a clean-up and annual maintenance of the
area.

He said the debris field below the bridge where the rubble lies
from the portion of the bridge that fell in 2003 will remain where
it is, and hopes it will be set up in a way that visitors will be
able to see it up close.

“We would have to control the vegetation so people can see” the
debris, Comoss said. “That’s part of the story. We’re planning on
fencing off the area for security purposes (so no one gets hurt),
but we hope we can fence it up in a way that people can still get
close enough and see the debris field. Once we start building the
visitor’s center, we plan on making a series of trails down the
hillside to the valley.”

The second phase of the project will include the construction of
this visitor’s center and the paths to the debris field along with
the construction of a new park office, a maintenance building, a
small sewage treatment plant, a public water system and two picnic
pavilions.

“Right now, we’re pretty excited about what we’re doing at the
park,” Comoss said Wednesday.

Comoss said they’ve been working on the final design of the
bridge, and they’re just waiting for the necessary funding before
putting a bid out for the construction, which he said should be
sometime in the summer. He hopes the construction will start in
late summer or early fall.

“We (also) need the usual regulatory permits from the
(Department of Environmental Protection) and the (U.S.) Army Corps
of Engineers since it’s crossing along a waterway,” Comoss said.
“We’ve been working on the permits for the last few months now. All
that should be finalized by the spring.”

Comoss said the entire project will cost an estimated total of
$4 million to $5 million and estimates the entire project should be
completed sometime in 2009.

“If we stay on schedule without any delays, it should be
completed in the summer of 2009,” Comoss said. “When the visitor’s
center is in place, we hope to tell the history of the bridge and
talk about how the tornado hit it. People can see the gap where the
towers fell and see the debris field.

“I think there’s a lot of people interested in that. (It should
draw more people back to the park) assuming that there is still an
interest in the bridge to people interested in trains and bridges.
There’s (also) a historical component there.”