How would you like to adopt a massive bridge?
We’re not talking about adopting it for litter cleanup. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is offering the old Bourne and Sagamore bridges to the public before the bridges are replaced.
Though the step is required by law, the announcement Tuesday seemed to come with a touch of humor in its title, “Historic Bridges Available for Adoption.”
“Adopters” would take possession of one or both of the bridges that have served as the gateway to Cape Cod since 1935.
“This means literally moving the bridge to a new location,” said Troy Darr, an Army Corps spokesperson for the New England region.
Each bridge has a main, arched span of 616 feet, but the steel-trussed approaches make their overall length much longer: Including two concrete abutment spans on each bridge, the Sagamore is 1,833 feet long, and the Bourne is 2,684 feet long, the Army Corps said this week.
Moving them, in whole or in part, would be no small job. The steel alone on the Bourne Bridge weighs more than 7,200 tons, according to Southland Holdings, the successor company to the original builder.
Darr said things like this have been done before — most famously with the 1831 London Bridge.
The stone facing from the London Bridge was indeed reassembled on a bridge in Arizona; it opened in 1971.
The Army Corps is accepting proposals for what to do with the old Cape Cod bridges until June 26.
