Sandy Creek Bridge

The Sandy Creek Bridge stands in its namesake Sandy Creek Covered Bridge Park near the small community of Remote, about thirty-one miles west of Roseburg, and is the sole surviving covered bridge in Coos County. Originally built in 1921 to carry Oregon Route 42 itself across Sandy Creek near its mouth on the Middle Fork Coquille River, the 60-foot bridge was rendered obsolete when a new highway bridge bypassed it in 1949, but rather than being demolished it was simply left standing. By the early 1980s the aging structure had fallen into disrepair, until the Lions Club of Myrtle Point adopted it as a community project in 1982, rebuilding the roof, replacing structural timbers and decking, clearing brush, and repainting it, work that culminated in the dedication of a dedicated county park around the bridge in 1984. The bridge is a notable engineering rarity among Oregon's covered spans: rather than a single Howe truss chord, it uses two crossed Howe truss members on each chord, an extra-reinforced design uncommon on such a short span. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, the Sandy Creek Bridge no longer carries vehicle traffic and today functions purely as a historic display and footbridge within its park, complete with a tourist information booth and picnic area.