Ribbon-cutting ceremony touts Lake Park Aqueduct Bridge

COSHOCTON – Monday’s temperatures in the low 80s attracted plenty of walkers to cross the Lake Park Aqueduct Bridge, part of the Three Rivers Bikeway.

“My friend and I usually start at Roscoe and run and then go around,” said Keely Mackey, of Coshocton.

At about noon Monday, Mackey brought her sister, Gracie Smart, 4, and her new puppy, Eve, for a walk along the trail and across the bridge, which spans the Walhonding River. She just got the puppy for Christmas.

“This is my first time bringing the dog,” she said.

Just moments before Mackey crossed the bridge, state and local officials unveiled a new plaque commemorating it and hosted a ribbon-cutting ceremony to officially reopen the span, which recently underwent about $600,000 in renovations, according to Lori Everhart, director of the Coshocton Park District.

“It’s a very positive thing going on in the community,” Everhart said. “It will stand for decades to come.”

“It’s so important. It connects the park with Roscoe Village,” said Kathy Thompson, former executive director of the Coshocton Foundation, which helped orchestrate local funding for the work. “It’s a wonderful bike and walking trail.”

The Stanley Miller Construction Co. started working on the bridge in October and completed the project by the end of January, Everhart said. The company repaired the bridge’s north abutment and pier bracing, replaced its deck surface and all handrails, and installed new pier fender pilings and erosion protection to the north and south banks.

The work cost just over $600,000, counting engineering costs, Everhart said, and was funded mostly through a Transportation Enhancement Grant from the Ohio Department of Transportation. The Coshocton, Montgomery and Rotary foundations and the Friends of the Parks provided a 20 percent local match.

ODOT Spokesman Matt Bruning was on hand for Monday’s ceremony.

“This is just part of what ODOT does,” Bruning said. “It’s not just roads and highways. We also like to get involved in bike and walking trails.”

The second-longest aqueduct on the Ohio and Erie Canal was built at the bridge’s current site in 1830, Everhart said. Fifteen-feet wide, it extended 310 feet. It carried canal boats from Middle basin, now known as Lake Park, across the river, through locks and eventually to Roscoe Village, she said. Flood waters destroyed the canal, lock and aqueduct system in 1913, and they were never rebuilt, Everhart said.

The existing footbridge across the Walhonding, 326 feet long, was built from 1969 to 1971 on the original alignment of the aqueduct, Everhart said, and is now used as part of the Three Rivers Bikeway.

Officials began noticing the effects of erosion in 2007 and began stabilizing the structure with temporary measures the following year. Local fundraising and grant applications followed.

jwilliams6@coshoctontribune

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