LOOKBACK: Creek crossings today once spanned massive railyard
Overhead pedestrian bridge crossed eastside Austin tracks from 1895 to 1994 before relocating to golf course, parks, nature center
By Tim Ruzek, CRWD
On a fall 1894 evening, Emil Umhofer left work at a downtown Austin butcher shop, picked up groceries and began a 1-mile walk to the eastside railyard.
A married man with eight children, the 55-year-old Umhofer always had to cross the expansive Milwaukee Road railyard — more than 700 feet wide with 16 rail lines — to get home.
That night, Umhofer was crossing the railyard when he was struck and thrown under a locomotive switching rail cars. He was killed instantly.
“Those who are kicking on the (idea of an) overhead bridge across the Milwaukee tracks should make a note of this sad accident,” wrote the Mower County Transcript. “The present condition of accommodations for crossing are simply abominable.”
Citizens had asked for an overhead bridge before Umhofer’s death but the crossing wouldn’t happen for another year. Once built, the bridge stood for nearly a century (1895–1994) until being dismantled, with sections now crossing creeks and low-lying areas in and just outside of Austin.
Austin’s Jay C. Hormel Nature Center has four crossings using the old bridge. Meadow Greens Golf Course has four sections and Todd Park has several others.
In 1890, citizens first petitioned the Austin City Council for an overhead bridge over the railyard in line with Water Street (4th Ave NE). At the time, east of the tracks was rather isolated with modest homes, “shanties and shacks.”
Three years later, the council ordered Mower County to build an overhead bridge because the county was in charge of bridges under a special 1885 local law.
But that didn’t happen.
By 1894, the railroad barricaded a street during the “great railroad strike” and built a fence along the railyard’s east side, blocking travel on streets crossing the tracks. When securing the railway shops and division point, the city let the railroad occupy certain east-west streets.
Austin’s council soon ordered a crew take down the railroad’s fence but held a special meeting the next day to order the crew to put the fence back up after the railroad threatened to move out of Austin.
By June 1894, 450 people signed a petition asking for the bridge because the railroad’s fencing made eastsiders go a half mile out of their way. The county board approved $5,000 for an overhead bridge, and the railroad placed a flagman paid by the city at the railyard until it was built.
A year later, the bridge still wasn’t built due to differences between the city, county and railroad.
“Those on the east side of the tracks are practically shut out from communication with the rest of the city,” the Mower County Transcript wrote Feb. 27, 1895.
This debate went to the Minnesota Supreme Court, which ruled the 1885 law required Mower County to build an overhead, pedestrian bridge.
The Transcript called the ruling “certainly fair” as more than half of the county’s bridge tax revenue raised in Austin was spent outside of the city.
On Christmas Day 1895 — more than a year later — the Austin Daily Herald announced the iron bridge was done after the county started work in early November.
Standing about 25 feet above the railyard, the 12-foot-wide, iron bridge featured electric lights and spanned 555 feet with 170-foot approaches on each end.
“It will be a great convenience to those living east of the tracks,” the Herald wrote.
Yet, the bridge also proved to be an inconvenience many times dye to maintenance issues and its ability to attract wild or criminal behavior.
In 1905, a 7-year-old boy fell off the bridge onto rails while throwing empty glass bottles at the tracks. He broke a leg and badly burned his hands from grabbing telegraph wires.
Other incidents included an intoxicated man trying to jump from the bridge onto a rail car (he fell to the ground and survived but was arrested); a few cases of young women walking off the bridge and being assaulted by men hiding under it; and kids “coasting” on bicycles and sleds down the bridge’s approaches.
Despite the bridge, the railroad still frequently pleaded in newspapers with parents to make sure their children did not cross the tracks or crawl under railcars.
People threw things off the bridge and set fires on purpose or by accident with a lit cigarette while also causing other vandalism, such as ripping off railings and breaking lights.
“Young hoodlums” loitered at the bridge, annoying people crossing it after work. Others were “peeking toms” using the bridge to look in an adjacent hotel’s windows.
Eastside parents in 1924 claimed the bridge was a hazard for sending elementary students across to attend Lincoln School. Kids were harassed and sometimes assaulted by older children.
In 1925, someone drove a car up the bridge’s west approach, crossing the railyard until getting stuck in the east approach’s tight turn. The driver had to back out.
Structural challenges also led to bridge closures affecting eastsiders significantly.
Austin’s historic 1908 tornado and hailstorm blew away the bridge’s western approach.
In June 1913, the bridge was closed for its east approach being rotted. It wasn’t replaced until February 1914.
People also requested more foothold strips and better snow removal on approaches for better safety, especially for the elderly.
In February 1917, the county closed the bridge for being in a dangerous condition that could lead a heavy wind to blow it over. Many spots had iron nearly eaten through by rust. The county did this despite inconveniencing people having to walk through snow.
“We must protect the lives of those who use it if it were not closed, and we must protect the county also,” the county engineer said.
At the same time, the county considered creating a tunnel under the railyard to replace the bridge but deemed it too expensive and something for the city.
Debate ignited again over responsibility for the bridge — the county, city or railroad? The county attorney said the county should not have built the bridge in 1895 nor have to rebuild it.
When soldiers returned by train to Austin in September 1917, hundreds stood on the condemned bridge, gathering on its south side. Luckily, they had not stood on its north side as locals later thought that might have led to many being injured or killed.
“It was an oversight that this (bridge) had not been closed to travel,” the Herald wrote.
By September 1918, the county had gotten out of the bridge issue, leading the city to investigate its condition. Then the city completely closed the bridge, mainly due to two, heavily rusted spans.
“It is clear that it was necessary to close the bridge but it is also clear that this bridge is not only a convenience but almost a necessity,” the Herald wrote.
In December 1918, Austin’s mayor reached an agreement with the railroad to split the $6,600 cost of a new bridge. The mayor wanted approaches removed to keep people off the bridge because barricades and “Danger” signs kept getting removed.
Some councilmen fought to keep the bridge open for kids going to school and others who would need to walk a long distance around. Some believed rumbling trains proved more of a risk to the bridge than people.
In January 1919, the first carload of material arrived for a new bridge.
“This will be good news to the people of the Fourth Ward who have either had to take a chance on the bridge falling down with them or being run over in the yard,” the Herald wrote Jan. 9, 1919.
Five months later, Austin’s mayor wrote the railroad leader, pleading for work to get going.
Not until June 1919 did all bridge materials arrive in Austin, and then bridge builders came two months later.
This new version of the bridge opened Oct. 4, 1919.
Soon after, reports arose again of people coasting down the bridge and crossing the railyard instead of using the bridge. Both acts could lead to arrests.
While many treasured the bridge, it wasn’t enjoyed much in the winter.
“That was pretty cold going for little folks in December, January and February,” a Herald article stated July 7, 1936.
Sometimes local newspapers ran “scare ads” related to the bridge. One claimed in all caps that a boy was run over at the train depot. In smaller type, the ad explained the boy ran over the railyard by using the overhead bridge to deliver a box of cigars.
During World War II in 1943, the railroad again pleaded with the public not to unlawfully cross the tracks as “the yards are in the ‘war zone.’”
In 1957, people living east of the tracks asked the council for permission to walk through the railyard. The council declined, noting the danger and railroad’s liability.
At the time, the Milwaukee Railroad was flourishing, with the bridge spanning 20 tracks.
By the mid-1970s, the railroad was seeking to remove the bridge for liability reasons after the rail industry’s decline. The city chose to keep the bridge open and pay all costs of upkeep after finding that 80 to 100 people crossed the bridge in an 8-hour period.
By the 1980s, the railroad’s presence in Austin had declined greatly. Some called the overhead bridge an “eyesore.”
Talks of removing the bridge resurfaced in 1983 when a contractor removing rail ties said he could remove the bridge for salvage. At the time, the county owned the bridge; the city was responsible for it; and the railroad owned the land under it.
In 1985, the city closed the bridge for safety, leading people to push for saving it, including with a 500-signature petition. At that time, the railroad owned the bridge and the city maintained it and held its liability. The city was looking at replacing the bridge with a sidewalk through the railyard.
Over the coming years, people wrote in the Herald about saving the bridge and reminiscing about it, such as watching circus trains unload near the depot and walking on bridge rails.
“Some call it an ‘eyesore,’ others call it ‘junk,’ ” wrote long-time railroad worker Richard Kelly in 1989. “One man’s junk is another man’s treasure; it’s all in the eye of the beholder.”
Kelly described the thrill of being in position on the bridge above passing steam engines to get “engulfed with cinders and smoke.”
In 1988, the railroad’s 20-stall roundhouse, built in 1874, was demolished as part of a railyard cleanup.
Four years later, the council approved removing the bridge, leading to another effort to save it.
“Talks of dismantling the historic overhead railroad bridge on Austin’s east side has touched a nerve,” the Herald wrote in 1992.
In 1994, the council finally approved bids to dismantle the bridge in part to clear the way for extending Fourth Avenue through the railyard, which never happened due to railroad opposition.
Bridge sections were sold in 1995 to the golf course, with the rest moved to the nature center and Todd Park. The council had declined requests from individuals to buy bridge sections, opting not to sell to private groups offering limited or no public use.
