Chain Bridge (Massachusetts)

Chain Bridge
Chain Bridge, 1990
Coordinates	42°50′01″N 70°54′24″W / 42.8337°N 70.90674°W / 42.8337; -70.90674
Carries	Vehicular and pedestrian traffic
Crosses	Merrimack River
Locale	Newburyport, Massachusetts
Official name	Essex-Merrimac Bridge
Characteristics
Design	Suspension bridge
Longest span	225 feet
No. of spans	1
History
Designer	George Fillmore Swain & Robert R. Evans
Construction start	1909
Construction end	1910
Statistics
Toll	No
Location

The Chain Bridge in Newburyport, Massachusetts, is a "look-alike" replica built in 1910 to replace the "first suspension bridge" constructed in the United States in 1810. Since the current structure is one of a series of bridges at this location since 1793, it is "the oldest continually occupied, long span, bridge crossing" in the US.^[1][2] It has also been called the Essex-Merrimac Bridge^[3] or Newburyport Chain Bridge.^[4]

It is a 225-foot chain bridge, a single-span suspension bridge, which crosses the right branch of the Merrimack River as it flows around Deer Island. The boundary between the cities of Newburyport and Amesbury, Massachusetts, runs through Deer Island, so Chain Bridge connects the two communities. Crossing from the island to the left bank of the Merrimack requires traversing the Derek S. Hines Memorial Bridge, formerly the Essex-Merrimack Drawbridge, which was reconstructed and reopened in August 2012.^[5] As the Chain Bridge is better known because of its structure, it is sometimes incorrectly identified as a single bridge spanning the Merrimack.^{[citation needed]}