Monroe County to get 1st covered bridge in 4 decades

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) – Monroe County will get its first covered bridge in four decades when it rebuilds a historic span that stood near Shelbyville for 90 years.

County officials are using an award from the National Historic Covered Bridge Preservation Program to repair and rebuild the Cedar Ford Covered Bridge that once spanned the Little Blue River.

The Herald-Times reports the bridge was dismantled in 1975 to make way for a new bridge and is in storage in Greene County.

The Cedar Ford bridge will be rebuilt near the location of a bridge that burned in 1976.

Project manager Jim Barker says the bridge’s parts aren’t in perfect condition but that crews will be able to use about a third of the structure’s original timbers, which were cut in the 1870s.