Gay Street Bridge

The Gay Street Bridge is a vehicle bridge that crosses the Tennessee River in Knoxville, Tennessee, United States. Completed in 1898, the 1,512-foot (461 m) bridge is the oldest of four vehicle bridges connecting Downtown Knoxville with South Knoxville, the other three being the Henley Street Bridge, the Buck Karnes Bridge (Alcoa Highway), and the South Knoxville Bridge.

The bridge is a steel spandrel-braced (cantilever) arched design with a concrete deck. There are five arched trusses, each 252 feet (77 m) long, and two 126-foot (38 m) approach spans at each end, all supported by a foundation of stone piers. The deck is 42 feet (13 m) wide, and consists of two vehicle lanes, each flanked by a pedestrian sidewalk. The bridge originally contained trolley tracks, but these were removed in 1950.

The first bridge across the Tennessee River at this site was a temporary pontoon bridge built during the American Civil War. It was followed by a permanent bridge with stone supporting piers, built by Union General Ambrose E. Burnside, that was washed away in a flood in March 1867. Knox County built a covered bridge at the site, which opened on May 2, 1875, but it was blown down by a tornado shortly afterward. The county sold the surviving piers and rights-of-way to G. W. Saulpaw, who built a wooden Howe truss bridge at the site in 1880. Saulpaw's bridge stood until 1898, when it was demolished after the completion of the Gay Street Bridge.

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