HUNTINGTON WV/ASHLAND KY roadmeet
Apr. 6-7 2013
PART 5
Northwest on KY 244 (Bellefonte Street) in Russell, Ky. The old US 23!
Continuing on KY 244. Fans of aging signage should be pleased to know that the ONE WAY sign isn't exactly a spring chicken.
Endangered, but not to be forgotten. This is the Kentucky approach to the Ironton-Russell Bridge. The stairway at left goes down to Riverside Drive - but the steps are presumably closed because of the falcon hazard.
Heading back to Ironton, Ohio, on the bridge. Ohio welcomes you...you you you...pow! Seriously, that sign looks like it predates the "Ohio's for you" campaign (where that jingle came from).
Getting off the bridge in Ironton. The street ahead is Campbell Avenue, which provided another round of amusement for us.
On Campbell at Adams Street, looking onto the bridge approach. Here we see another type of near-extinct sign: a yellow yield sign. These abounded through the 1970s, but they're almost all gone now. Highway authorities tried defacing this one by covering the lower part with a green background for additional wording, but we got the last laugh, because that part was fading.
Not exactly sure what this is. This might be looking over at Campbell from a block over. The barriers exist because this is where the Ironton-Russell Bridge replacement is being built.
If I had to guess what street this is, I'd say 2nd. Piers for the new bridge are visible at right.
Campbell Avenue again. The approach to the old bridge is ahead. A pier for the new span is at right.
Looking up Monroe Street. The pile of dirt and bridge parts in the foreground displaced a block of Monroe. And the stop sign is faded too. A life that once held so much promise is now but a shadow of its former self.
Looking way up Campbell. This is when we experienced one of the funniest moments of the entire roadmeet: We had our Scholaring motorcade parked along the road, when a hapless gent drove along and apparently called the police on his cell phone. Over nothing. So we skedaddled out of Ironton.
US 52 east in Ohio. We're getting on the left-hand ramp that goes to the pair of bridges to Ashland. Although the one-way bridges make up Spur US 23, I don't recall seeing any signs to that effect.
Northeast on 15th in Ashland.
An Allowed Cloud gets violated, as we zip through a closed drive-thru at a bank to arrive at our meeting spot.
Fourteenth Street. The buildings in the background are on Winchester Avenue.
I have no idea where this is. It could be somewhere off US 60 near Grayson, Ky.
In southern Carter County, we find this. This bridge is along Old KY 1. There was a rail line here before KY 1 was built.
Continuing on Old KY 1 - the stretch that replaced a rail line.
Old KY 1 takes us to this old bridge over the Little Fork Little Sandy River. The wooden decking for this span is gone, but it used to carry KY 1. Before that, the railway used it. But it's believed that no cars have used it since the 1940s.
Another view of the old bridge.
Another surprise: Along KY 773 near Grayson, this is the first of 2 very similar one-lane bridges over the Little Sandy that occur one right after the other.
This is the second such bridge.