Richmond’s Only Drawbridge: the Bascule Bridge in Great Shiplock Park

The stained, rusty structure looms over the forest canopy of Chapel Island in Richmond’s Great Shiplock Park like some vine-choked, antiquated, and long-silent machine that ground to a halt on the edge of the canal. The railroad bridge it is attached to looks just as derelict except for a shine on the rails, indicating recent use. This is Richmond’s only drawbridge, and even though it is slightly more than a hundred years old, the technology of this bascule bridge is ancient.

Richmond’s only drawbridge, the Norfolk and Southern Railway’s crossing of the canal at the Great Shiplock Park.

The term, “bascule” is French and refers to a balance-beam scale, and as it pertains to drawbridges, is a design that relies on a counterweight to lift a heavy bridge surface. The most famous bascule bridge in the world may be the Tower Bridge in London, with two spans lifted by counterweights concealed in the bridge towers. The advantage of the design is that it requires comparatively little energy to raise the balanced weight of the bridge, and once raised, there is usually unlimited overhead clearance.

A sketch of a bascule bridge by Leonardo Di Vinci, circa 1470, from the website of the Collaborative Organization for Virtual Education. Note the container of rocks on the right which counterbalances the weight of the bridge itself.

The construction date of the Richmond bridge is unclear. The Richmond port authorities threatened legal action against the railroad in 1913 for not having personnel on duty to open the bridge as it was blocking access to the docks. It is unknown if this was the bridge on the site now, or a predecessor. A historical marker that was once in the Great Shiplock Park gave the construction date as 1930, although the railroad bridge is clearly pictured in a photo of the floating tourist attraction, the “Convict Ship Success” when it visited Richmond in 1929. Advertisements at the time noted the ship was tied up at the “foot of Seventeenth Street,” meaning the far western end of the Richmond dock, so the bascule bridge had to open to accommodate it.

The railroad track surface of the open bascule bridge looms over the “Convict Ship Success” when it visited Richmond in 1929. Here, the counterweight has pivoted down as the bridge surface is raised. The Shockoe Examiner explored the story of the “Success” and this “floating fraud” in 2018. 

The railroad line that still uses the bridge was originally built to connect the deepwater port of West Point and its wood pulp industry with Richmond. The rusty bridge in the Great Shiplock Park appears derelict but is still a vital link for the modern Norfolk and Southern Railway. Trains loaded with pulpwood and paper products still clatter across the canal on this bridge as they have for almost a hundred years.

A side view of the railroad bridge, showing the rocking chair-like mechanism. When released, the huge block of concrete suspended above the tracks rocks down, raising the bridge surface into the air.

This is the famous 1934 “Pegasus Bridge” bascule bridge in Normandy, which was a critical objective in the early stages of the invasion of France in 1944. It is maintained in perfect condition as a war memorial. Note the same counterweight and rocking mechanism seen in the Richmond bridge.

A photo of the bridge in 1941 when it still opened for ships to reach the Richmond docks. There was a substantial two-story control structure beside the bridge which no longer exists.

 

This solid concrete counterweight of many tons which is suspended over the railroad tracks, once lifted the bridge surface into the air, allowing shipping to pass through the Richmond locks and into the James River.

Today, the massive concrete counterweight is still mounted in the air above the bridge, although the machinery to control it was said to have been removed in the 1980s and the bridge welded in the down position. Freezing the bridge in this way blocked traffic from the former docks and signaled the end of centuries of downtown Richmond’s water-borne trade. This was a role was taken over by the “Intermediate Terminal” facility downriver from the city. In 1940, Richmond’s Deepwater Terminal was opened at a location further downstream on the south bank of the James, which today accommodates modern shipping in containers as well as bulk commodities.

The fact Richmond’s bascule bridge still has its counterweight in place may mean that one day the welds that hold it in the down position might be ground off and the bridge opened once more. Or, trying to remove the tons of concrete held above the trees of Chapel Island may simply be too expensive. In either case, the bridge and its mechanism remain as a rust-stained display of an ancient technology, largely unchanged since the time of Di Vinci. The bascule bridge, like the nearby ship locks, is a surviving element of the once-vibrant downtown port facility that drove the Richmond economy for generations.

 

 -Selden