Though not hugely active, this spot provides for great photo ops when a train passes, as it passes over a 1902 truss bridge with a swing section at the near end of the bridge. This it possibly the only movable bridge in the Kootenays. At least we know of no others. The bridge is beside a parking lot for a nature trail that runs along the left bank of the Columbia River.
When the Columbia & Kootenay Railroad arrived in Castlegar around 1896, the major venue for commercial and passenger traffic in the area was the Columbia River. It was the Highway for several sternwheelers, all of which were owned by Canadian Pacific by that time. Canadian Pacific bought this railroad and continued it west to Grand Forks prior to construction of this bridge.
As the railroad entered Castlegar on the north side of the Columbia, a bridge was necessary in order to access points south, most notably the Cominco lead/zinc/gold smelter(which the CPR also owned at the time) about 25 km to the south, down the Columbia River Valley. In order to allow the paddlewheelers free passage, it was deemed necessary to include a movable section in the bridge. The bridge itself wasn't built until 1902.
However, there was no longer a need for river traffic south of Castlegar and the sternwheelers ran only north from to Castlegar, as far north as Revelstoke. As a result, the swing section of this bridge was used exactly once, to our knowledge.
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