MEYERSDALE, Pa. -- The Bollman Bridge, a 30-ton cast and wrought iron truss bridge serving the Great Allegheny Passage bike trail in southern Somerset County, is scheduled to be lifted into place today.

Listen In: Linda McKenna Boxx, president of the Allegheny Trails Alliance talks about the structure of the Bollman Bridge. Brett Hollern, Somerset County Trail Coordinator talks about the importance of the Bollman Bridge and future plans for the trail.

Two cranes were expected to lift the span into place yesterday morning, but they didn't arrive until 1 p.m. It was then determined that more site work had to be done so the cranes had a level surface from which to work. A load of stone was ordered from a nearby quarry.

The 24-foot-high, 100-foot-long bridge last year was lifted from its former site about two miles northwest of Meyersdale. It was disassembled because it couldn't be transported in one piece to its new location about two miles southeast of Meyersdale. It was reassembled on the trail, about 12 feet from the first of two pile-driven abutments that will support it over Scratch Hill Road.

"The [crane crew] will take a few hours to set up everything and then we'll be good to go," said Rolland Rhodomoyer, consultant to the Somerset County Rails-to-Trails Association. "You don't want any slip-ups."

Summit Township late yesterday gave permission to Bryce Saylor & Sons Crane Service of Altoona to block Scratch Hill Road until the bridge is in place.

Bicyclists should be able to use it by mid-August, said Brett Hollern, Somerset County trail coordinator. "We have to install a deck and railings and build the trail up to it."

The bridge, which features cast iron scrollwork over the portals, was built in 1871 by a construction company owned by Wendell Bollman. It carried B&O Railroad traffic over Wills Creek in Hyndman, Bedford County.

Mr. Rhodomoyer said it was moved to its first Meyersdale area site in 1896 to serve road and farm traffic over what are now CSX and Amtrak railroad tracks. "It's in good shape," he said.

When PennDOT notified the Somerset County Rails-to-Trails Association that the well-preserved bridge was to be demolished, the association and other rail-trail organizations worked hard to save it.

"It was well worth it," said Linda McKenna Boxx, president of the Allegheny Trail Alliance, the coalition of seven rail-trail groups building and maintaining the multi-use, non-motorized trail from Pittsburgh to Cumberland. "It's a beautiful bridge and it fits perfectly here."

The bridge will eliminate a bumpy dirt, gravel and rock detour down to, across and up from Scratch Hill Road.

The bridge, overshadowed at its old site by the nearby 1,908-foot-long Salisbury Viaduct, once again finds itself with a bigger neighbor. It's about a quarter-mile from the imposing Keystone Viaduct, a 910-foot-long span with a curved concrete deck that sits about 100 feet above Flaugherty Creek.

The Bollman Bridge is part of a 42-mile section of the passage that runs through Somerset County. It begins in Confluence, crosses the Salisbury, Keystone and several other renovated railroad bridges and goes through the 3,300-foot-long Big Savage Tunnel. It ends at the Maryland border.

When completed next year, the Great Allegheny Passage will extend 150 miles from the Point in Pittsburgh to Cumberland, Md., where it joins the 182-mile C&O Towpath to Washington, D.C.

For more information on the Great Allegheny Passage, go to www.atatrail.org or call 1-888-282-2453.