Swinging Bridge

[Abby Brown] When a river runs through your town and you need to get across, it's not always practical to drive. And swimming or boating can be a little inconvenient. So in 1937, this beauty was constructed.

(A suspension bridge with large steel towers on either side is positioned over the river.)

(Map marking Emmet County in northern Iowa.)

Did you know Iowa has 25,000 bridges?

Next time you drive on a bridge that spans a waterway, check out the legs of it.

(A concrete bridge with three piers that form arches just above the water’s surface.)

Are some of them in the water? Can you imagine how complicated, time consuming, and expensive it would be to build a bridge like that?

(A railroad steel-truss bridge with stone piers.)

Sometimes a bridge solution needs to be simpler, especially when it's for people and not vehicles.

This is the Estherville Swinging Bridge.

It was built in 1937 and updated in 2011 to keep it strong and safe.

It stretches over the West Fork of the Des Moines River. So when you walk across, there's some pretty impressive scenery to check out.

This bridge's legs are not in the water. They're on land, which makes maintenance a whole lot easier.

How does the structure of this bridge work with no legs in the water?

A series of cables anchored to the legs and land. The bridge is suspended between two anchor points.

A bridge like this is great because it can withstand strong wind and rain. But there's a catch. It swings.

Out of the thousands and thousands of bridges in Iowa, only about 14 or 15 are swinging, or suspension, bridges meant solely for people to walk across.

That makes the Estherville Swinging Bridge a rare sight to see and a lot of fun to experience.

Every county in Iowa has history hovering nearby. Thanks for crossing the swinging bridge with me here in Emmet County.

Funding for FIND Iowa has been provided by The Coons Foundation, Pella and the Gilchrist Foundation.