Questions, answered

Measuring the span

Measure bank to bank at the point where the bridge will sit, not at the narrowest point of the creek. Then add bearing at each end. The bridge has to land on something stable, and that landing is part of the span you order.

If the banks are uneven, or if one side is undercut, photograph both and send them. That single detail changes more designs than any other.

Choosing a width

• 4 feet carries foot traffic, bikes, and equestrian use.
• 8 feet carries a single vehicle: a cart, a UTV, a truck, a tractor.
• 10 feet carries maintenance vehicles or two-way cart traffic.

Width is where people economize and then regret it. A 4 foot trail bridge cannot later take a mower.

The vehicular family

Utility Truss is the family built for vehicles. All 21 cataloged models are rated 8 ton, or 16,000 pounds, in 8 and 10 foot widths across spans from 20 to 72 feet.

Bolt-together kits are rated 4 ton, which covers lighter equipment.

What to tell us

Total weight is the start, not the answer.

• The machine, loaded, including anything in the bucket or on the forks
• Anything it tows, and whether that is on the bridge at the same time
• Axle spacing and tire or track width
• Whether it crosses occasionally or several times a day

A skid steer concentrates its weight over a short wheelbase. A pickup of similar weight spreads it. Those are different problems for the same rating.

Do not extrapolate from a video

Load test footage shows a specific bridge in a specific configuration carrying a specific machine. It proves that test. It does not establish what a different model in a different configuration will do on your site.

The published ratings

Family	Rating	Applies to
Utility Truss	8 ton / 16,000 lb	All 21 cataloged models, 8 and 10 ft widths, 20 to 72 ft spans
Bolt-Together Kit	4 ton, 2 tons per axle	All 8 cataloged models, 20 ft span
Pedestrian	90 PSF	All 9 cataloged models, 40 to 72 ft spans

Why the family rating is not your answer

A rating describes a tested and engineered configuration. Yours may differ in deck, rail, bearing condition, or approach grade.

Two loads that weigh the same can also behave differently. A skid steer concentrates its weight over a short wheelbase; a pickup spreads it. Axle spacing matters as much as total weight.

Tell us the heaviest thing that will cross, including anything it tows or carries, and we will confirm it against the engineered configuration.

What a bridge starts at

Published starting prices, for the base bridge and nothing else:

• Bridge Kits from $4,950
• Trail Bridges from $18,950
• Utility Truss from $20,750
• Pedestrian Bridges from $42,650

Those are the cheapest model in each family. They exclude freight and taxes, and they are not a quote.

What moves the number from there

Span and width set the structure. Load rating sets the steel. Finish, decking, and railing move it from there. Freight is its own line and depends on where you are and what can reach the site.

A bolt-together kit at a 20 foot span and a 72 foot pedestrian bridge engineered to AASHTO LRFD are not variations on one price. They are different products.

Why freight is quoted and not calculated

It depends on permit routing, oversize escorts, whether a crane is needed, and what the carrier has running that week. A published freight figure would be wrong often enough to be worse than no figure. Tell us the delivery ZIP and what is waiting to unload, and it gets quoted with the bridge.

What you can do now

Configure your bridge online. Pick the application, dimensions, load, finish, decking, railing, and delivery format, and send it. What comes back is a quote against that configuration rather than an automated number.

Why checkout is not open yet

A bridge is not a product that can be safely sold to an address nobody has seen. Before an order can be taken responsibly, four things have to be settled:

1. Freight, confirmed rather than estimated
2. Engineering review of the configuration against the actual crossing
3. Who is responsible for installation and site preparation
4. Where a raw steel finish is chosen, acknowledgement of what that means

Those are the gates being built. Standard kits are the first products that will clear them, because they are genuinely standard.

Custom stays quote only

Custom bridges will not enter checkout. There is no standard product to price.

The inputs

• Crate dimensions and weight for the specific model
• Freight class, which comes from density
• Origin and destination
• Whether the delivery is commercial or residential
• Limited access, liftgate, or inside delivery requirements
• Whether a crane is needed at the receiving end

Why you get a range

A quoted number implies a commitment we cannot make before the route and the site are checked. A range with a preliminary label tells you what to budget without pretending to be a contract.

Every estimate moves through three states: estimated, then under review, then confirmed. Nothing becomes binding at the first state.

What routes straight to a person

Oversize loads, remote destinations, island delivery, limited access, and anything needing a crane. These are not edge cases we approximate. They go to manual review, because guessing on them is how customers get a bill they did not expect.

Delivery formats

Fully assembled. The span arrives complete on a truck and is set on abutments with a single crane pick.

Bolt-together kit. Ships flat, assembles on site, no crane.

The questions that actually matter

Getting a bridge to your address is rarely the hard part. The hard parts are:

• Can a truck of that length physically reach the site, including the last quarter mile and any turns, gates, or overhead limits?
• Is there room to stage the delivery and position lifting equipment?
• Is the ground firm enough for a loaded truck and a crane?
• Who is there to receive it, and with what?

Photographs of the approach are worth more than a description. Send them early and the delivery plan gets built around reality.

Fully assembled spans

These arrive complete and are lifted directly from the truck onto the abutments in a single pick. You need lifting equipment rated for the span and positioned where it can reach both the truck and the final location.

An excavator of the right size handles many of these. Longer spans need a crane.

Bolt-together kits

Kits exist precisely for sites where a crane is not practical. They ship flat and go together on site with hand tools.

Do not guess this

Undersized lifting equipment is the most common way a delivery day goes wrong, and it is expensive when it does. Ask us for the lift requirement for your specific model and span before you book anything.

What the bridge actually needs

A bridge needs two things at each end: something that will not move, and enough bearing area to spread the load into it.

Concrete is the most predictable way to provide both, which is why it is recommended for many applications. It is not the only way, and on some sites the existing bank conditions do more of the work than people expect.

What decides it

• Soil type and bearing capacity
• Bank height, slope, and whether either side is undercut
• Water behavior, including how high it gets and how fast it moves
• The load crossing, and how often
• Frost depth in your climate

How it gets decided

During the site evaluation. Someone walks the proposed location with the people responsible, looks at grade, access, hazards, utilities, and what would have to be demolished or moved.

That visit happens before fabrication, not after, which is the point of it.

The set versus the project

Two different questions get asked with the same words.

The set is the day the bridge arrives and goes onto the abutments. On a prepared, accessible site that is often completed in about a day.

The installation phase covers pre-construction coordination, delivery scheduling, the set itself, and the final walkdown. That runs two to three weeks.

Where the whole project sits

A typical project runs about 12 weeks end to end:

Stage	Duration
Site evaluation	1 week
Bridge design	1 to 3 weeks
Fabrication	5 to 6 weeks
Installation	2 to 3 weeks

What moves the schedule

Site preparation is the variable that moves most. If abutments are not ready, or the approach cannot take a truck and a crane, the set does not happen on schedule regardless of how quickly the bridge was built.

Why pedestrian spans are their own case

People assume a walking bridge asks less of its foundations than a vehicular one. Over a short span that is roughly true. Over 40 to 72 feet it is not.

A long pedestrian span is heavy before anyone walks on it, and all of that weight arrives at two bearing points. The reaction at each end can exceed what a shorter vehicular bridge produces.

Part of the engineering, not a site decision

Because these models are stamped and sealed for the project jurisdiction, the abutment design is part of the package the plan reviewer sees. It is engineered alongside the span rather than worked out when the truck arrives.

Concrete foundations are recommended for many applications and may not always be required. What your site needs comes out of the site evaluation and the structural design.

Powder coat

The standard finish across the catalog. It is a coating applied to protect the steel, and it is what the published 65 year design life assumes.

Raw steel

Raw steel arrives bare. It will oxidize, and it will keep changing. How quickly, and how far, depends on humidity, rainfall, salt exposure, and how much of the structure stays wet.

Three things to be clear about:

1. The appearance will change, and that change continues over time.
2. Maintenance may be required to keep the steel where you want it.
3. It is not equivalent to powder-coat protection, and it may not suit every climate or application.

Surface oxidation on these bridges is a finish condition. We will not describe it as a protective coating, because it is not one.

Choosing

Raw steel makes sense if you want a lower upfront cost, intend to finish the steel yourself, or genuinely want a weathered look and accept the maintenance that comes with it.

If the bridge is going somewhere humid, coastal, or hard to reach for future work, powder coat is the better call. Tell us the site and we will say which one we would specify.

Design basis

Bridges are engineered to the appropriate AASHTO LRFD standard for the use case. For pedestrian models that is the AASHTO LRFD Guide Specifications for the Design of Pedestrian Bridges.

Designs are stamped and sealed for the project jurisdiction under the International Building Code, which is what a plan reviewer needs to issue a permit.

Tell us the jurisdiction first

Local conditions drive the design: snow, wind, and seismic loads, vehicle loading, road elevation, and access limits. Those are inputs to the engineering, not adjustments made afterward.

A project that names its jurisdiction in week one gets a design that passes review. A project that names it in week eight gets a redesign.