Spanning the Portage
Bridges carry much more than cars.
In the Keweenaw, the Portage Lake Lift Bridge connects the two halves of the Keweenaw Peninsula. It spans the Portage Canal, which runs both east and west to Lake Superior.
In June 2022, this beautiful bridge was dedicated as a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark. The bridge is the world's heaviest and widest double-decked vertical-lift bridge.
Opened in 1959, the Portage Lake Lift Bridge is the only land-based link between the north and south sections of the Keweenaw Peninsula.
Opened in 1959, the Portage Lake Lift Bridge replaced a narrow steel swing bridge, which was declared a menace to navigation on the busy waterway after several ships collided with it. An earlier wooden swing bridge spanned the channel from 1876-1895.
More than 35,000 tons of concrete and 7,000 tons of steel went into the current lift bridge at a cost of nearly $13 million. The bridge was designed by Hazelet and Erdal of Chicago and built by the American Bridge Company.
About 175 yards long, the bridge is crossed by more than 20,000 vehicles daily. Two lanes of traffic move in either direction. A single railroad track below the lower deck was abandoned in 1982. The middle section is capable of being lifted from its low point of four feet of clearance over the water to a clearance of 100 feet to allow boats to pass underneath.
The cities of Hancock and Houghton hold an annual Bridgefest celebration in June to commemorate the opening of the bridge, which united the two communities.
For those of us who grew up in the Keweenaw, the bridge is an indelible reminder of the area, its history, and the people who call it home. We may have heard stories from our parents and grandparents of the earlier bridges and the challenges of crossing the canal. We all cross many bridges over the course of our lifetimes, both literally and metaphorically. Bridges, it seems, not only connect and carry us, but also our memories.
Related reading: Ice Lovers is a beautiful essay by David Rompf. He tells the story of his grandparents who lived on opposite sides of the Portage Canal but, nonetheless, started an unlikely courtship in 1915.