The Bridges And Structures
Of The Lower Mississippi River

This is my third installment of the bridges and structures of the Mississippi River, covering the Lower Mississippi from south of Cairo, Illinois, to the gulf coast. Cairo is the dividing line of the upper and lower river, the point where the Ohio merges in carrying water from the Wabash, Tennessee, and Cumberland rivers in its flow. From there, the great river flows south to the Gulf Of Mexico.

The lower Mississippi is very different from the upper river. The upper river has many islands, back channels, and back water areas. Crossing are often 5 miles wide. In contrast, the lower Mississippi runs in a single narrow deep channel at a relatively fast rate of flow. Through most of the lower region, the Mississippi gets deeper rather than getting wider. As a result, this is some of the deepest fresh water in the world, with the river bottom being below sea level up past Baton Rouge and into southern Mississippi.

For a bridge or structure to be included, it has to cross the main channel of the mighty river. As a bonus, I have included some of the more interesting of the non-main channel structures. I only use my own photography. In fact, that is the trick—getting to visit all these structures and finding locations to shoot photos while maintaining a decent sun angle to light the bridges. I started this project with a mid-level instamatic digital camera. While I was impressed with what this little camera could do, I often found myself limited compared to what my SLR cameras could do. As a result, I upgraded to a Minolta digital SLR, and I am reshooting many of these structures as time permits.

Taking photos of these bridges can be surprisingly difficult. First, they are big. That means you have to get back quite a ways to capture the profile of a bridge. That allows plenty of room for things to get in the way, such as structures and trees. Second, most of these bridges are located in areas where it is hard to get a good line of sight. That might be because there are no secondary roads in the area, or the land is private and posted for no trespassing. Third, the main spans are usually inside of the levee systems, but in most cases, it is not legal to drive on or cross a levee. Finally, these bridges are busy, so you have to be very careful to avoid being in an accident or causing an accident. Bridges rarely have pull-offs, viewing areas, or even places to legally stop to take a photo.