Abandoned Railroad Bridge

This place is on private property. Listing for informational purposes only. Please do not visit without express permission from the land owner. This abandoned bridge is located at Gulch on the White Pass & Yukon Railway near Skagway, AK. Although Skagway is located more than 500 miles from the gold fields in the Klondike, the town benefitted from the discovery because of its location along a transportation route to Canada's interior. The Klondike Gold Rush established Skagway, but its ice-free, deep water port and the completion of a railroad to Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, in 1900 kept the town alive. In May 1898, the company which became the White Pass & Yukon Route began constructing the first major commercial railroad in Alaska. Beginning in Skagway, the narrow gauge railroad wound through the twisting, narrow, rock-strewn wilderness of the White Pass. The completion of the railroad from Skagway to Bennett Lake in June 1899, and to Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, a year later, secured Skagway's role as the main transportation gateway to the interior of northern Canada. Without this improved transportation method, the neighboring town of Dyea could not compete and was soon abandoned. The railroad company helped Skagway's economy at a time when the prosperity of the gold rush period was diminishing. It provided jobs and built large machine shops, an office building, hospital, residences, and even a private athletic club. When completed in June 1900, the $10 million White Pass and Yukon Route railroad connected the geographical area outside of Alaska and northern Canada with the Klondike. Steamers from West Coast cities docked at Skagway's port where freight and passengers loaded directly onto the train. The railroad carried goods and passengers 110 miles north to Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, where they transferred to sternwheel steamers on the Yukon River and continued on to the Klondike. This was a tremendous improvement over earlier transportation methods. Travelers no longer had to carry supplies on their backs or lead overburdened pack animals over the agonizing Dead Horse Trail. This railroad is one of 20 engineering feats in the world declared an International Historic Civil Engineering Landmark. Since 1978, the Klondike Highway has connected Skagway to Canada's interior. A transportation gateway for commerce and tourism, Skagway serves as an example of how a frontier town survived the end of its boomtown era.