International Railway Bridge, Buffalo–Fort Erie

The standing point is the paved Shoreline Trail on the west bank of Unity Island, inside Unity Island Park, the City of Buffalo park on the northern end of the 160-acre island that separates the Niagara River from the Black Rock Canal. The first river span of the International Railway Bridge leaves the island about 130 m (425 ft) due north of this point, and the truss spans then run west-southwest for roughly 560 m (1,840 ft) to the Fort Erie shore. From the trail the whole river crossing reads as one diagonal line, south face toward you, with the Ontario shore behind it.

This is a freight-only bridge. It carries Canadian National's Stamford Subdivision, the line that links CN's Niagara Peninsula network to Black Rock Yard in Buffalo, and Canadian Pacific (now CPKC) has used it on trackage rights since late 2001. Trains are slow here: OpenStreetMap tags the bridge track at 10 mph (16 km/h), and Wikipedia notes that trains are often seen at or near a stop on the bridge while undergoing security checks to cross the international border. A stopped train on the spans is therefore normal, and gives time to change lenses or walk the trail for a second composition.

There is no timetable to consult, so plan on waiting. Stay on the trail and the park lawns: the embankment that carries the line across the island and the bridge itself are railway property at an international boundary, and the contributor who documented the site's 1973 historical marker notes that the bridge is watched by the US Border Patrol.

The bridge crosses the upper Niagara River just below its outlet from Lake Erie, a wide channel that Wikipedia describes as up to 14 m (45 ft) deep, flowing at up to 19 km/h (12 mph). Unity Island Park was built on the capped former dump at the island's north end and is now grass, paths, picnic areas and a riverbank used by anglers. The Black Rock Riverside Alliance places the park inside the Niagara River Corridor Important Bird Area, with 190 bird species recorded.

The bridge is a long row of pin-connected Pratt through trusses on stone piers. HistoricBridges.org points out its decorative portal bracing and a portal cresting that still carries the name International Bridge. The part that crosses Unity Island is not a bridge at all: Wikipedia records that it was first built as a trestle and filled into an embankment soon after opening in 1873. Across the water is the Bridgeburg waterfront of Fort Erie, Ontario; about 2.5 km (1.5 mi) upstream to the south, the Peace Bridge carries road traffic over the same river.

On the island's east side, the Black Rock Canal and, beyond it, the I-190 Niagara Thruway separate the park from the Buffalo mainland; the river side of the island, where this spot is, faces open water and the Canadian shore.

The International Railway Bridge opened on 3 November 1873. It was built for the International Bridge Company, formed by the Grand Trunk Railway, and designed by Casimir Stanislaus Gzowski with D.L. MacPherson; the Buffalo History Museum notes that Gzowski was almost 60 when he took on the job. The bridge gave railways a direct crossing between Canada and Buffalo, and over the years it was used by the Grand Trunk, the Great Western, the Canada Southern, the Erie, the New York Central and the New York, West Shore and Chicago, according to Wikipedia.

Little of the 1873 structure remains above the waterline. HistoricBridges.org records that in 1901 a completely new superstructure, built by the Detroit Bridge and Iron Works of Detroit, replaced the original trusses and reused only the 1873 piers; Wikipedia dates the modification to 1900 and notes that the pedestrian walkway on the main span was removed at that time. The whole crossing is 1,113 m (3,651 ft) long.

It was built with two swing spans. The one over the main river channel, which does not cross the international border, ceased to open some time between 1941 and 1944; the one over the Black Rock Channel on the US side still swings. The bridge carried one daily passenger car until 1934, and its busiest day was 10 July 1916, with 264 trains. In February 1993 operations were suddenly suspended because of problems with stone piers, and CN spent $2 million to put the bridge back into service; HistoricBridges.org notes a further rehabilitation around 2000 that replaced much of the floor system. In late 2001 Canadian Pacific abandoned its route via Niagara Falls, Ontario and moved its traffic onto this bridge. A 1973 marker at Niagara Street and Bridge Street, erected by the Polish Union of America and the Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society, honours Gzowski's work.

This is a working international rail border crossing watched from a free city park: the Canada-United States boundary runs along the river beneath the spans in front of the standing point.

Two Class I railways share one track here, CN as owner and CPKC on trackage rights, and trains routinely stop on the bridge for border security checks, which is rare anywhere else on the network.

The bridge keeps two swing spans of different eras of use: a main-channel swing frozen in place since the early 1940s, and the Black Rock Canal swing, still in service and shared with a single-lane road deck and a bicycle lane. HistoricBridges.org considers the bridge significant for its length and its pinned connections.