North Fork Yachats Bridge
Lincoln County, near Yachats. Built 1938, 42 ft. long. One of the few Oregon covered bridges built on a rare queen post truss.
The North Fork Yachats Bridge crosses the North Fork of the Yachats River about nine miles northeast of Yachats by river road, and is one of the shortest covered bridges in Oregon at just 42 feet. Built in 1938 for a modest $1,500 by Otis Hamer, a prolific Lincoln County bridge builder, it was the last covered bridge Hamer ever built. Unlike the Howe truss design that dominates nearly all of Oregon's surviving covered bridges, North Fork Yachats uses a rare queen post truss, making it one of the state's few surviving architectural examples of that construction method. It is one of only two Lincoln County covered bridges still open to vehicles, alongside the Chitwood Bridge. A 1987 accident damaged the structure, prompting a thorough 1989 renovation that replaced the trusses, roof, siding, and approaches. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places on November 29, 1979, the bridge remains open to vehicle traffic today with a ten-ton weight limit, closed to large trucks and RVs, and continues to serve the rural community along the Yachats River watershed.
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