Looking N from I-64 near 13th St..
<p>.
Towboat "Betty June Walker" (doc. # 248942) upbound in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisville_and_Portland_Canal" class="extiw" title="w:Louisville and Portland Canal">Portland Canal</a> , passing under lift span of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourteenth_Street_Bridge_(Ohio_River)" class="extiw" title="w:Fourteenth Street Bridge (Ohio River)">Conrail (later L&amp;I) Bridge</a>.
[Another name for this bridge which remains constant despite changes in ownership is the Fourteenth Street Bridge.]
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The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertical-lift_bridge" class="extiw" title="w:Vertical-lift bridge">lift span</a> was built in 1918, replacing an earlier <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swing_bridge" class="extiw" title="w:Swing bridge">swing span</a> at this location. This was about the time that the canal was widened from 90 to 200 feet, the 600-foot lock was built and the pool above the dam was raised eight feet to 420 feet above sea level.
The span is 260 feet long (horizontal clearance for boats is 242 feet) and weighs about 2.6 million pounds.
In the lowered position, vertical clearance above the river (at pool stage) is 39 feet; when raised, the clearance is 70 feet.
The weight of the span is supported by a total of 64 two and one-eighth inch steel cables which pass over sheaves at the tops of the towers and connect to two huge counterweights.
Because the weight of the span is balanced by the counterweights, it can be raised and lowered by a relatively small electric motor inside an enclosure on top of the span.
The towers and machinery of the lift span were designed by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Alexander_Low_Waddell" class="extiw" title="w:John Alexander Low Waddell">[J.A.L.] Waddell</a> and Son, Inc., and there is a plaque on the span reading, "Waddell Vertical Lift Bridge, Waddell and Son, 1917".
</p><p>See <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=njp.32101061103881;view=1up;seq=1033">"Engineering News-Record", Vol. 82, No. 21, pp. 1007-1011 (May 22, 1919)</a>
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<a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://heavymovablestructures.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/0092.pdf">"Dr. J. A. L. Waddell's Contributions to Vertical Lift Bridge Design" (a 2002 paper in PDF format)</a> from <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://heavymovablestructures.org/">Heavy Movable Structures</a>, a not-for-profit technical organization.
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Guidewall at lower right looks fairly new, but I don't know when it was constructed.
</p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio_River" class="extiw" title="w:Ohio River">Ohio River</a> mile 605.
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisville,_Kentucky" class="extiw" title="w:Louisville, Kentucky">Louisville, Kentucky</a>.
February 1988.
file # 88b102.
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35 mm Kodachrome.
Plustek OpticFilm 7600i and Silverfast 8.
Picture Window 6.
</p>
JPEG quality 95.
<a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://www.flickr.com/people/70020260@N04">William Alden</a> from Louisville, Kentucky, USA
CC BY-SA 2.0
<a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/bill_alden/15529761814/">88b102: Betty June Walker upbound in Portland Canal at Conrail Bridge lift span</a>