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Quarry Ridge - Strathcona County Pedestrian Footbridge | ?m | ?s | River Valley Alliance

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Approximate location:
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this bridge looks pretty decent and distinct from other pedestrian/cycling bridges around the city. sorry if this is off-topic, but are there any other plans (even if mostly hypothetical at this point) for other bridges that allow transit/vehicles/pedestrians to cross the horse hills area to around fort sask? this area and the deep south (41st ave or ellerslie if it wasn't already built up) i can foresee as connectivity issues as the city continues to sprawl. of course this wouldn't be necessary if the city didn't continue to sprawl, but that's going to continue for the foreseeable future, so i was just curious!
 
@dunno There were plans for another vehicular crossing in the northeast, but they were scrapped:

Likely the need evaporated somewhat when they decided to focus on twinning the Highway 15 bridge instead:
 
I was actually talking with a friend about that just this morning. I wish the old rail bridge was still there, would have made an excellent pedestrian/cycling crossing:

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ETA: This may have actually been an old alignment of highway 15 rather than a railway. Trying to find out...
 
Ah, it was a rail crossing:

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Construction of a new pedestrian footbridge that will link Edmonton and Strathcona County and will provide access to future regional park projects.
Municipality: Edmonton, Strathcona County
Sector: Tourism / Recreation
Type: Other
Schedule: Completion by 2024
Estimated Cost: $25.0M
Stage: Proposed
Developer: River Valley Alliance
Related Links: Aug 7, 2020 - Sherwood Park News

 
Ah, it was a rail crossing:

View attachment 264848
It was actually both! It honestly looked like a mini Hogh Level Bridge to me; I wish it was preserved as well, because it was gorgeous. A long-time resident told me that before the bridge was demolished, a grass fire near the wood supports on the Sturgeon side weakend the wooden supports. Perhaps CN had no choice but to demolish it? That's what the resident claimed. Also, the bridge demolition was featured in a Fort Sask minor hockey raffle; the winner got to push the plunger.
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The last two pictures were taken in January 1987, shortly before the bridge was demolished. The wooden car deck was removed in the 1950s after the current car bridge opened. The deck was replaced with the bridge because it was only one lane; traffic lights (added later on in the bridge's life) on either end ensured that only one side had the right of way at a time. At night, some impatient drivers would run their red light if they didn't see headlights coming towards them! You can learn more at the Wikipedia article I linked above; I put a lot of time, effort, and research into it.
 
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Rode the trail Strathcona County and Fort Sask built along the river today. The Riverside Nature Trail. I absolutely loved it. to be honest, i had read a bit about it (partially thanks to this thread) and didn't think much of it; it sounded like something rather minor. I really enjoyed the trip, and wound up riding all the way to Northern (Downtown) Fort Sask. the train network on this side of the river has a lot of potential, and Fort Sask has an absolutely spectacular network, particularly given its size.
I didn't really plan the excursion today, so I went around Quarry ridge, across the river via the Henday, then by Yellowhead Agregates to Aurum Road, all the way to the trailhead (an odd example of the City's mandatory road design standards, I think. Elm boulevards, sidewalk on one side, SUP on the other, plowing past gravel lots and industrial facilities. nice to be on, for sure, but odd given the utilitarian surroundings) and then took the trail to Fort Sask. On the way back, I attempted to use Aurum to cross the Henday, then use frontage roads to get to Strathcona Science Park. the Park has good connections to Rundle, and is in turn easy to access for East/Central Edmonton. This did not work, and resulted in a lot of backtracking. I checked google, and if you follow the Riverside Nature Trail, it follows/turns into 232, which turns into Sherwood Drive, which eventually intersects with Petroleum Way. Petroleum Way gets you from the middle of Sherwood Park all the way under the Henday and to the Park. the Bike infrastructure along 232 is not continuous to allow for that. In short, the while the trail itself is nice, accessing it is complex, and you either go through the middle of Sherwood Park next to major roads, or go through quieter industrial areas to get to it. This new bridge will make all of that circuitous routing unnecessary.
I wasn't quite sure what this bridge was supposed to connect; but after seeing the trails on that side of the river, and the potential for better connections, I am very excited to see this built out. riding between Fort Sask and Clareview LRT Station is decently viable, and this crossing would cut out all the unpleasant Strathcona County industrial area segments, and make the distance more achievable for a most riders.

Edit: very fried mentally. this post does not make the point i was aiming for. long story (see above) short, based off today, biking from Clareview LRT to Fort Sask, via this VERY LOVELY trail is about 35-40km (based off Strava from today and google maps, which reads neither the Riverside Trail nor the Henday Crossing), but with the new bridge, going from Clareview to Fort Sask via quarry ridge (guesstimated off Google and PDF maps) would be about 20 km, and involve a lot less riding near traffic.
 
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