Skip to main content

A Tale of Two Cities and Two Bridges - Durham's Can Opener and Raleigh's Peace Street Bridge

Image
By

Raleigh and Durham, North Carolina.  Two cities - roughly twenty miles apart.  Both are growing, have their own identity, and a little bit of a rivalry.  The major international airport is Raleigh-Durham, but don't tell anyone from Raleigh or Durham that they are the same city.

There are a variety of different yet similar things in both cities.  One example is two separate bridges - both carry trains, eat trucks annually, and are beloved in their unique way.

Raleigh's Peace Street Bridge and Durham's Can Opener Bridge (located at South Gregson at West Peabody) are both low-clearance Norfolk Southern railroad overpasses that for decades have taken out numerous unsuspecting tractor-trailers.  Each bridge resides near their respective city's downtowns - Durham's Brightleaf District and Raleigh's Glenwood South.  Over the years, the two bridges have generated media attention and a social media following.

Durham's Can Opener Bridge:


The bridge opened in 1940 carrying the Southern Railway over Gregson Street.  Today, the tracks remain in operation with Durham's Amtrak Station a few hundred yards to the southeast.  Initially built with a clearance of 11 feet and 8 inches, the Gregson Bridge had a well-known and earned reputation as a truck eater by the late 1960s.

The bridge became a local and later worldwide celebrity in 2008.  A local professional, Jürgen Henn, placed a video camera in his Brightleaf Square office to record traffic.  A few weeks later, he captured his first crash.  A year later, he added a second camera.  A YouTube channel was created - the videos were so successful that Henn created a website documenting the bridge's mishaps.  In addition, you can buy bridge merchandise.

Durham's formerly 11'8" Gregson Street Bridge now has a 12'4" clearance.

It wasn't until 2019 that the Gregson Street Bridge saw clearance improvements.  A $500,000 safety improvement allowed transportation officials to raise the Gregson Street Bridge another eight inches to a 12-foot-4-inch clearance.

Raleigh's Peace Street Bridge:

The Gregson Street Bridge clearance now matches the clearance of the other Triangle truck-scalping bridge, Raleigh's Peace Street Bridge.   The 12'4" low-clearance bridge is the second rail bridge to sit just east of the Glenwood Ave. and Peace St. intersection.  

Raleigh's Peace Street Bridge - the current version has been in place since 1963. (Adam Prince - September 2023)

The first Peace Street Bridge was a basic plate girder design erected in 1948 that carried over the Southern, now Norfolk Southern, Railway at a 12-foot clearance.  That bridge was replaced in 1963 by the current bridge.  When completed clearance was only improved by 4".

Annually since then, the bridge has claimed its share of 18-wheelers, moving trucks, and more.  The bridge is a staple of Raleigh social media - and has its 'own' Twitter account.

Tale of the Tape:

Both bridges are local community iconic landmarks. So how do they measure up against each other?

* - Number calculated from 11foot8 data of 178 trucks over 15 years. 
** - Raleigh Peace Street Bridge merchandise is done by a local clothing company.

Durham's bridge is older, and from its years at a lower clearance has eaten more trucks annually.  However, Peace Street's numbers are from trucks that were physically stuck under the bridge.  The Durham bridge stats count partial shaves and trucks that have been able to get through the underpass.  

The Peace Street Bridge does NOT, to my knowledge, have an active webcam that monitors the bridge and then has any incidents shared online.

In the end, the victory goes to Durham.  The bridge's video documentation and internet presence are far greater than its feisty neighbor down the line in Raleigh.

Further Reading:

Sources & Links:

Where To Find Them:
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Interstate 40's Tumultuous Ride Through the Pigeon River Gorge

By
In the nearly 60 years Interstate 40 has been open to traffic through the Pigeon River Gorge in the mountains of Western North Carolina, it has been troubled by frequent rockslides and damaging flooding, which has seen the over 30-mile stretch through North Carolina and Tennessee closed for months at a time. Most recently, excessive rainfall from Hurricane Helene in September 2024 saw sections of Interstate 40 wash away into a raging Pigeon River. While the physical troubles of Interstate 40 are well known, how I-40 came to be through the area is a tale of its own. Interstate 40 West through Haywood County near mile marker 10. I-40's route through the Pigeon River Gorge dates to local political squabbles in the 1940s and a state highway law written in 1921. A small note appeared in the July 28, 1945, Asheville Times. It read that the North Carolina State Highway Commission had authorized a feasibility study of a "...water-level road down [the] Pigeon River to the Tennessee l
3 comments
Read more

Mines Road

By
Mines Road is an approximately twenty-eight-mile highway located in the rural parts of the Diablo Range east of the San Francisco Bay Area.  Mines Road begins in San Antonio Valley in Santa Clara County and terminates at Tesla Road near Livermore of Alameda County.  The highway essentially is a modern overlay of the 1840s Mexican haul trail up Arroyo Mocho known as La Vereda del Monte.  The modern corridor of Mines Road took shape in the early twentieth century following development of San Antonio Valley amid a magnesite mining boom.  Part 1; the history of Mines Road Modern Mines Road partially overlays the historic corridor used by La Vereda del Monte (Mountain Trail).  La Vereda del Monte was part of a remote overland route through the Diablo Range primarily used to drive cattle from Alta California to Sonora.  The trail was most heavily used during the latter days of Alta California during the 1840s. La Vereda del Monte originated at Point of Timber between modern day Byron and Bre
Post a Comment
Read more

Interstate 210 the Foothill Freeway

By
The combined Interstate 210/California State Route 210 corridor of the Foothill Freeway is approximately 85.31-miles.  The Interstate 210/California State Route 210 corridor begins at Interstate 5 at the northern outskirts of Los Angeles and travels east to Interstate 10 in Redlands of San Bernardino County.  Interstate 210 is presently signed on the 44.9-mile segment of the Foothill Freeway between Interstate 5 and California State Route 57.  California State Route 210 makes up the remaining 40.41 miles of the Foothill Freeway east to Interstate 10.  Interstate 210 is still classified by the Federal Highway Administration as existing on what is now signed as California State Route 57 from San Dimas south to Interstate 10.  The focus of this blog will mostly be on the history of Interstate 210 segment of the Foothill Freeway.   Part 1; the history of Interstate 210 and California State Route 210 Interstate 210 (I-210) was approved as a chargeable Interstate during September of
Post a Comment
Read more