52 



THE BOROUGH OF THE BRONX 



1895, when a Third Macomb's Dam, or Central Bridge, a steel 

 structure, took its place. 



The oldest bridge across the Harlem today is the famous 

 High Bridge, which was completed in 1849. It is 1,450 feet long and 

 25 feet wide, and extends between West One Hundred Seventy- 

 fifth Street and Tenth Avenue, Manhattan, and Aqueduct Avenue 

 near One Hundred Seventieth Street, The Bronx. It is an excel- 

 lent example of masonry arch construction, and is one of the sights 

 of the neighborhood. 



High Bridge, as the name suggests, was so constructed as not 



Courtesy Department of Bridges, City of New York 



Willis Avenue Bridge 



to interfere with the navigation of the Harlem River. This was 

 the effect of the decision rendered by the courts of the State of 

 New York in connection with the Macomb's Dam Bridge. It had 

 been planned to conduct the water of the Croton River by means 

 of a low siphon bridge across the Harlem River to supply water 

 to the City of New York. But the decision of 1839 caused the 

 Legislature to pass an act directing the water commissioners to 

 construct the aqueduct over the Harlem River with arches and 

 piers ; the arches to have a span of at least eighty feet and not less 

 than one hundred feet from the usual high-water mark of the river 

 to the underside of the arches of the crown. 



