The October 9, 2006 issue of The Transcript covered a local story regarding The Wrong Way Bridge in Cambridge, written by J. B. McKinley with three Clark Dodge Photos and one map provided by Robert Moore:
THE WRONG WAY ON PURPOSE?
PURSUING THE MYTH
by J.B. McKinley
It depends on who you ask, what story you hear that explains the curve in the "Wrong Way Bridge" on Route 15 in Cambridge. Some draftsman copied the blueprint wrong; or an off site deskbound engineer pulled out a bridge plan with a standard curve of the correct degree, but drew it the wrong way on the plans. One thing is certain, most wrong way myths blame state engineers and most stories accuse the then Vermont Highway Department of making a huge, but almost slapstick error in planning. Of course, it's probably only funny if you've merely read about the bridge instead of driving over it a few times a day for years. Then the fact that the bridge makes Route 15 tortuously double back on itself becomes an inconvenience and a hazard. Albeit, one of the more long lasting inconveniences most of us have ever experienced!
When Bill Moore, of Hyde Park, popped into the newspaper, brandishing a bit of writing by his father, he offered a different explanation. One that's much less humiliating for the state!
Robert Moore, of South Burlington, was a long time employee of the Burlington company that provided the structural steel for the Wrong Way Bridge. He wrote that he was always curious about the bridge ~
"I was always puzzled by the bridge's configuration. The bridge curves around to the left towards the villages of Fletcher and Fairfield, rather than curving around to the right to carry VT Route 15 towards Jeffersonville.
How come, I once asked... the late Stearns Jenkins, a career engineer...[for the state]
"Stearns explained to me that this project was part of a post WWII plan to rearrange the highway between the villages of Cambridge and Jeffersonville... it was a four part plan."
Moore wrote that he was never sure of the order, or priority of each of the four steps, but they were:
1) Move Rt. 15 from Jeffersonville's Main Street to someplace westerly;
2) relocate Seymour Brook to join the Lamoille farther upriver and east of the existing two lane covered bridge in Cambridge;
3) replace both covered bridges in Cambridge with one steel bridge;
4) relocate Rt. 15 behind Cambridge Village on the abandoned roadbed of the Burlington & Lamoille Railroad right of way (See map: RR is labeled Central).
With hindsight, it appears that Moore's (or the state's) first three parts were accomplished. What amounts to a Jeff bypass was built, Seymour Brook's confluence with the Lamoille River was moved eastward and Cambridge's two most obvious covered bridges were either removed or moved and replaced by the Wrong Way Bridge.
But, as Moore writes, "Part four - alas, the State of Vermont never proceeded to relocate Rt. 15...along the then abandoned B & L RR R.O.W."
The Seymour Brook bridge was literally put out to pasture on the nearby Gates Farm, where it still stands, and the "Double barrelled" 168 foot covered bridge with a walkway is at Shelburne Museum, crossing a small pond dug for the bridge to span!
Sometime between 1949 and 1951, the $750,000 Wrong Way Bridge with a 395 foot steel and concrete bridge was constructed just upstream of the double bridge. An undated contemporary newspaper clipping of local historian, Clark Dodge's calls it the "latest in engineering know how and design" and does not speculate on its four-degree curve!
At the time, state highway bridge engineer, A.D. Bishop told the newspaper he disliked having the old double covered bridge discarded. Maybe his sentiment helped convince Shelburne Museum to save the bridge. After all, it had survived the 1927 Flood and served travelers for, according to various sources, at least 80 years and may even have stood from 1845 until 1951.
Will the Wrong Way Bridge last as long? Will it be venerated, eventually removed and set up in a museum? Will Cambridge ever want or get a bypass? Will we accept this version of highway history that the Wrong Way Bridge was really built the Right Way, and that it's the highway that didn't move? Will we ever really know?[/b]
