Talk:St. Johns Bridge

Comment
The Oregon Department of Transportation has this history for the St. John's Bridge" "Portland's northernmost Willamette River Bridge, the St. Johns, was finished in 1931. The bridge replaced the city's last ferry, which linked the communities of Linnton and St. Johns. The bridge is named for the community of St. Johns, which was named in honor of settler James John. Mr. John started the local ferry system with one rowboat in 1852. "Designed by internationally renowned engineer David B. Steinman (1886-1960) and Holton D. Robinson, of New York, the St. Johns was the longest suspension-type bridge west of the Mississippi River at the time of construction. It is the only major highway suspension bridge in the Willamette Valley and one of only three major highway suspension bridges in Oregon. The four-lane structure features lofty Gothic arch towers of steel, Gothic-inspired steel frame piers of reinforced concrete, and the longest "pre-stressed" steel cable rope strands designed up to the time of construction. Steinman also selected the color of the bridge, Verde green, which he chose to harmonize with the forest at the west end of the structure. ==Early discussion== still needs work —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cacophony (talk • contribs) 20:14, 31 August 2004 (UTC)


 * looks great to me-- lots of detail and especially like the helpful bike hints. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.194.214.194 (talk) 07:55, 26 March 2005 (UTC)

St Johns or St John's?
Hi... Most references I have seen to this bridge (I just revamped the David B. Steinman article) have it as St John's rather than St Johns. Which is correct? I would rather not put in a redirect the wrong way, and then find out it could not be moved... thanks.


 * BridgeMeister has it St John's
 * Structurae.de does too...

But ODOT does not. Thoughts?
 * St. Johns, Portland, Oregon is the propler spelling. Cacophony 05:02, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Wonder why all those sources have it wrong, then? Do you have a source for the spelling (well I guess if the city calls it that?) Thanks for the info! ++Lar 11:16, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I am not sure why there is no apostrophe in St. Johns. I have seen it refered to as St. John's as well, but the local maps/signs/stores refer to it as St. Johns .  You have piqued my interest enough that I asked: cityinfo@ci.portland.or.us  Cacophony 02:07, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
 * According to "Portland Names and Neighborhoods" by Eugene E. Snyder, the neighborhood was named after James John (or Johns, depending upon the source). This man who originally platted the townsite was also known as "Old Jimmy Johns" or "Saint Johns".  Thus, it's his last name "Johns" we are using, not a possessive term. Bryan2000 00:06, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

The article on OR DOT's website under the 2005 Rehab of the bridge has much of what is missing, like that the settler's name was Mr.John (not Johns) but the community is named St. Johns, etc at http://www.oregon.gov/odot/hwy/region1/pages/stjohns/index.aspx  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Davidcizen (talk • contribs) 05:23, 23 May 2016 (UTC)

Also how about adding this templatised link in the main article? ( Lat: 45.585 Lon:-122.76333 from Bridgemeister ) Some of the NY area bridges use this and it's cool. I will if no one objects. ++Lar 04:33, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
 * St. Johns Bridge is at 45.585°N, -122.76333°W


 * This information is included in the infobox at the right and I don't see a need to duplicate it. Cacophony 04:57, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Missed that! Never mind. I tend to overlook infoboxes... ++Lar 11:16, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Thelma Taylor story
I removed the following from the Thelma Taylor story: "The former is the general popular tale that turned Thelma Taylor into one of Portland’s most famous haunting stories. In 2007, an investigating paranormal research group known as 'The Northern Woods Paranormal Research and Investigations' (based out of the greater Portland area), uncovered facts from the 1949 murder, which exposed the truth behind the bridge haunting legend. The Northern Woods research provided documented evidence showing the exact location of Taylor’s murder, giving startling facts including the location as having been “In brush about 8 blocks North St. John’s Bridge” just over 24 hours after her kidnapping, thus contradicting with factual evidence that Leland murdered Taylor under the bridge after several days of repeatedly raping her as the story also goes."

It needs sources, and probably needs rewording. tedder (talk) 15:36, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Can we have more filler for the 18 years between bridge dedication and murder? It's rather stark going from "Yay Bridge", to "Oh No, crap! death" in the span of one carriage return. Was there any news about the bridge right after it was built? Needs some transition. Kristinwt (talk) 20:18, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

Not the Prototype of the Golden Gate Bridge
Despite the oft-repeated story that the St John's Bridge was the prototype of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, it was not. The towers of the St. John's Bridge are Gothic and the Golden Gate Bridge are Art Deco.

According to the Oregon Department of Transportation's website: "Designed by internationally renowned engineer David B. Steinman (1886-1960)and Holton D. Robinson, of New York, the St. Johns was the longest suspension-type bridge west of the Mississippi River at the time of construction.... Of the 400 bridges he was to design, Steinman said, 'If you asked me which of the bridges I love best, I believe I would say the St. Johns Bridge. I put more of myself into that bridge than any other bridge.' Contrary to popular belief, Steinman did not design San Francisco's famous Golden Gate Bridge."

The Golden Gate Bridge was designed by others, some of whom were from New York, as outlined at http://goldengatebridge.org/research/Design.php. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.53.47.236 (talk) 14:33, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

By way of comparison
It surprised me to read that the St. Johns Bridge was the longest bridge in Oregon because I was sure (just from driving across them) that the Interstate Bridge is longer. I read some more, and learned that determining the length of a bridge is quite complicated. It seems that the length between spans is significantly more interesting to some than the total length, so I created this table for my own enrichment. I doubt it has any real place in the article, but if you disagree, please add it in. ErinHowarth (talk) 17:10, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

What about other measurements? Can you add another comparison, Dirt to Dirt? Shore edge to shore edge?Kristinwt (talk) 20:13, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

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Is the St. Johns Bridge in St. Johns?
Ok, I'll admit this looks like a pretty ridiculous question. But in all seriousness, the answer is no. I think that the structures listed in Category:Buildings and structures in St. Johns, Portland, Oregon should be limited to those within the official boundaries of the St. Johns neighborhood, as seen on this map from the City of Portland or here on Google Maps. Because the St. Johns bridge isn't within these boundaries, I don't think it should be included in the category. I don't know what Portland's neighborhoods looked like in 1931—maybe the bridge was within the boundaries of St. Johns at the time it opened. I assume the bridge would have been within the limits of the city of St. Johns, but that was annexed to Portland well before construction on the bridge began. I know that when many people talk about St. Johns, they're referring to a much broader area than the official boundaries that are designated by the city. I don't think Wikipedia should do this though—it just seems sloppy and imprecise.

Incidentally, if we accept that the pages included in the category should be limited to those within St. Johns' official boundaries, that would mean that Burlington Northern Railroad Bridge 5.1 and Schrunk Riverview Tower should be removed from the category as well (Schrunk Riverview Tower is in Cathedral Park and the railroad bridge appears to be within the boundaries of that neighborhood as well, with some of it in the Northwest Industrial area). What are your thoughts? Lord Bolingbroke (talk) 17:15, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the explanation. I don't know that part of the city well enough to have known that the bridge doesn't actually go to St. Johns, and the WP articles on St. Johns and on Cathedral Park don't have any maps of their boundaries, only links to non-Wikipedia pages with maps. I suspect, as your comment also suggested, that a lot of Portlanders living outside North Portland think that the area formally known as the Cathedral Park neighborhood (which I'd never even heard of until I started editing Wikipedia) is part of St. Johns, even though that is technically wrong.  I have no objection to your removal of the articles on the St. Johns Bridge and Schrunk Riverview Tower from the St. Johns category, but I would oppose removal of Burlington Northern Railroad Bridge 5.1 from the category, because that bridge was built in 1908, when St. Johns was still a separate city.  According to the Cathedral Park article's current text, "The 1911 Sanborn Map Index for the City of St. Johns, Oregon, shows that the Cathedral Park neighborhood was part of the original City of St. Johns prior to annexation by Portland in 1915." Article subjects that relate to St. Johns and existed before 1915 should continue to be in the St. Johns cat (or appropriate subcat), since they have a direct historical connection to St. Johns. The Wikipedia article St. Johns, Portland, Oregon is not limited to the current boundaries of St. Johns (nor should it be).


 * And when was the Cathedral Park neighborhood officially created (as an official city neighborhood, with its own boundary)? That may have occurred much later than 1915, and if it was after 1931, then even the St. Johns Bridge was partially within St. Johns originally; on that basis, I'd advocate for putting the bridge back into that cat once the St. Johns article text has been updated with text mentioning the boundary change(s) and citing a reliable source.  I don't have enough interest to want to spend time researching that, but hopefully someone else will. BTW, personally, I don't even feel that these neighborhood cats warranted being created on WP, as the neighborhood articles are not sufficiently developed, but there's another WP editor here who is very inclusionistic. SJ Morg (talk) 09:55, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

Origin of the name
Maybe someone who's from Portland could add a bit about how the bridge's name is related to the neighborhood it leads into? Took me way too long to find that out using external searching. — TARDIS builder &#9993;  |       23:35, 25 November 2021 (UTC)