About three miles south east of
Carlinville, just off Route-4, there is a stretch of original Route-66 alignment
along Deerfield Road. The Route-4/Deerfield Road intersection is marked as
"18000E 1470 BLK." Where Deerfield Road crosses over Honey Creek is an original
Route-66 concrete bridge, which is well known by locals. The bridge was
constructed in 1920. A photo of its original construction plaque follows.
The bridge is closed to all traffic. The bridge is currently owned and
maintained by the Macoupin County Board of Directors. I understand that the
Board would be receptive to any good county promotion plan, such as business,
youth, tourism, or local history promotion (or better yet, all of those things),
even if such plans involved transfer of bridge ownership. I further understand
that county funds may be available to apply toward any organization with such a
sound plan.
The location of the bridge is about mid-way between historic,
or other tourism points of interest in Carlinville and Gillespie, which helps
draw travelers from one destination venue to the other, then the next (Benld).
One imaginative enterprise is using a creative "treasure hunt" concept to
encourage destination-oriented tourism. The geocaching website tells of
deploying small, weather-proof capsules at various points of interest. While the
objective of geocaching seems mainly to be entertainment, the concept could
easily be tailored specifically to promote tourism and local businesses. I found
a geocaching.com capsule at the bridge.
Contributed 2012 Nov 30 by Frank R. Masters
Macoupin County ILGenWeb Copyright
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This page was last updated
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