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254      The    WISCONSIN          ENGINEER
center piers. The first of these with two car tracks on an 18-
foot roadway is very crowded and much too light for its traffic.
The Beacher street bridge, though having no street cars, has
extremely light framing, and its turntable is nothing more than
a curved beam, the opening being accomplished by hand power.
The road is only eighteen feet wide, though the adjoining street
is more than twice that width. The Lincoln street swing, which
is the last one over the river, was moved to its present position
from Broadway when that bridge was rebuilt. The three other
swing spans over the Milwaukee river at, and north of Chestnut
street, though more adequate in some respects, obstruct the chan-
nel with their center piers.
  Viaducts in the city are very fine and serviceable, and even
attractive in certain details, though little effort has been made
in the selection of aesthetic outlines or proportions. The best
effect in viaducts usually results when bents are united in pairs,
with alternate spans differing greatly in length, and the truss
members curved rather than horizontal or parallel. The reversed
inclines to the Twenty-seventh street and the Sixth street via-
ducts adjoining the canal, are quite unusual, though a somewhat
similar spiral forms part of the Mississippi river bridge at Hast-
ings, Minnesota. The long and high viaduct over the Menominee
valley at Twenty-seventh avenue, has unfortunately, excessive
vibration in its longer spans, due probably to the top heavy ef-
fect produced by the heavy deck sixty feet wide for double car
tracks, and paved with brick and granolithic. The Wells street
viaduct, for double track electric service, with its deck 100 feet
or more above the valley, is quite imposing. Columns have side
batter, and vibration is not perceptible.
  IPark bridges in Milwaukee are also quite attractive, and could
hardly be improved. The stone and metal bridges in Lake Park
were erected in 1893 from designs by Mr. Oscar Sanne. A brick
one in this park was built with the body of the arch in five rings
of hard burned sewer brick, spandrel faces and wings of brown
brick, and the arch blocks on the face, as well as the trimmings
and railings of terra cotta. It has a length of 100 feet, and cost
$10,500. A metal arch with a clear span of fifty feet and length
of 90 feet, has a 26-foot roadway paved with asphalt on buckle
plates, and two 7-foot walks covered with cast iron plates. Steel