Jefferson Avenue/Huron River and Harbin Drive/Silver Creek Canal Bridges

The Jefferson Avenue and Harbin Drive Bridges are eligible for the National Register under Criterion A as an example of an assessment district project. In addition, the Jefferson Avenue Bridge is eligible under Criterion C as an early long-span stringer bridge. The Covert Act, passed in 1915, authorized the state highway department to serve as the legal agent for road projects involving two or more counties. The state held hearings, let contacts, sold bonds, and took care of other administrative matters for a given project, while the affected communities established an assessment district to help fund the improvements. Assessment District No. 463, which spanned Wayne and Monroe Counties, was created to improve a section of Jefferson Avenue, an important route connecting Detroit and Toledo. In 1930, the district and the state highway department jointly built a state reward bridge to carry Jefferson (also known as River Road) over the Huron River, the dividing line between the two counties. The new structure was designed by the state highway department. Although its design follows one of the department's standard plans, the bridge's three 55-foot spans are relatively long for that era. In the early twentieth century, the strongest I-beams manufactured by steel mills could span only 45 feet. In the late 1920s, new technology allowed mills to roll beams with deeper webs that could carry spans of up to 60 feet. The Jefferson Avenue Bridge replaced a 102-foot swing span, a Warren truss, as well as a 45-foot Pratt pony truss approach span, both of which were in very poor condition. The swing span may have been moved to serve as a detour during the construction of the new structure. The road grade by the new bridge was raised to eliminate the need for a movable span. The change in grade apparently necessitated a significant renovation of the adjacent Harbin Drive Bridge, which might have provided access to silica mines in the vicinity. The original construction date of the bridge is not known. In 1930, the spandrel walls and fill were removed and replaced. A new deck was built, and railings complementing the Jefferson Avenue Bridge were installed.

The Harbin Drive Bridge is located immediately adjacent to the Jefferson Avenue Bridge, which carries a major thoroughfare. The bridges are physically linked by a continuous wing wall curving from the northwest corner of the Jefferson Avenue Bridge to the Harbin Drive Bridge, which is oriented on a perpendicular axis. The appearance of the structures is also related: the earlier Harbin Drive Bridge was redesigned to complement the Jefferson Avenue Bridge when the latter structure was built in 1930. The Huron River serves as the boundary between Wayne County to the north and Monroe County to the south. Jefferson Avenue is about one mile inland from the Lake Erie shore. Harbin Drive is a dead-end unpaved road extending northwest from Jefferson Avenue, on the north side of the Huron River, to an area known as Fielders Island. The Silver Creek Canal flows into the Huron River immediately northwest of Jefferson Avenue. The three-span bridge carrying Jefferson Avenue over the Huron River measures 165 feet in length. Each 55-foot-long span is comprised of eleven I-beam stringers braced by square concrete units. Cavetto-molded concrete trims the outside stringers and supports the projecting edge of the 46-foot-wide concrete deck. Concrete railings have square-section spindles with two incised vertical lines ornamenting the sides facing the road and the exterior. Sidewalks flank the 36-foot-wide roadway. The bridge rests on concrete abutments and solid concrete piers with pointed cutwaters. The northwest wing wall of the Jefferson Avenue Bridge curves at a 90-degree angle to connect with the substructure of the Harbin Drive Bridge over the Silver Creek Canal. The closed-spandrel concrete-arch bridge consists of a single 45-foot span. The barrel vault forms an elliptical arch outlined by a recessed course. Like the Jefferson Avenue Bridge, the Harbin Drive structure has a concrete balustrade railing with square-section spindles trimmed with two incised vertical lines. The deck measures 27 feet wide.