In the mid 1880s, the Santa Fe decided to extend easward towards Chicago from it’s home base in Kansas. A major challenge was the bridging of the Mississippi River. Fort Madison had put in place mulitiple items that swayed Santa Fe to cross at their location in the form of a bridge charter, tax reductions and land for the railraods’ switchyards and shops, securing them the newest Mississippi River crossing in 1887. An influx of Santa Fe Railway workers resulted in the town being nicknamed “Boom Town”. The city was ill prepared. The town’s newspaper The Weekly Democrat noted: “Local citizens were slow to control wandering cattle in town who pirouette about the city parks and rush pell-mell through the streets.” The bridge was designed by Octave Chanute, an engineer whose theory of flying machines inspired Orville & Wilbur Wright’s first ever flying machine. Chanute started work on the structure’s timber pilings and masonry piers in April of 1887, completing theh 1,925 foot bridge by December of that same year. The original bridge consisted of an eight-span, single track passing through a truss bridge. A wagon lane jutting off the side, was held in place by brackets outside the trusss, making for a heart stopping crossing for wagons, foot traffic, bicycles and horseman. The original bridge was replaced forty years later. It could no longer safely sustain teh increasingly heavy traffic loads and the increasing size of the locomotives and railcars. In 1925, work started on the current bridge. Designed by A.F. Robinson of the Santa Fe Railroad.

The current Fort Madison Toll Bridge is considered the longest double-deck swing-span bridge in the world. Amtrak’s Southwest Chief crosses it on the way to and from Chicago to Los Angeles on the west coast. The structure consists of a riveted double track, double decker swing through truss, a nine-span deck girder on the Illinois approach, and a ten-span deck girder on the west approach and a 525 foot swing span. The bridge was built with 29 million pounds of meta and 46,000 cubic yards of concrete at a total cost of $5.5 million, and was formally opened to traffic on July 28, 1927. The 525 foot electrified swing span was the longest and heaviest in the country at the time it was built. River traffic, which has the right of way, results in the swing span being opened approximately 2,000 tiems annually. A typical opening of the bridge is to allow a tow with 15 barges through. The average length of time required is 15 to 20 minutes. Riverboats and barges tend to draw onlookers to Fort Madison’s Riverview Park, where they can watch them pass through the 525 foot opening.