The Shober Bridge (Ellis Street Bridge)

The Historic Neighborhoods Alliance met on January 13th for its first monthly meeting of 2010.  While the group heard updates from the historic neighborhoods present, the main focus of the meeting was how to save the Shober Bridge, also known as the Ellis Street Bridge.  The Shober Bridge crosses over the Southern Railroad tracks on Ellis Street between W. Kerr and W. Cemetery Streets.  The City of Salisbury, for several years, has had the "Ellis Street Bridge Project" on its books - with the ultimate goal to demolish the existing bridge and replace it with a modern structure, elevating the grade by several feet (reports vary here), and transitioning Ellis Street into a high functioning traffic corridor.  (The photo here is from the Salisbury Post, taken by Jon C. Lakey)


The Shober Bridge is one of the historic highlights of the Ellis Street Graded School Historic District, along with the school at the south end of the bridge.  It is unique in structure, a small humpback bridge with wooden handrails outfitted for pedestrian traffic.  The Shober Bridge has a good deal of folklore associated with it, but stakes its largest chunk of history as the very bridge site that General Stoneman's Union troops passed over to occupy the City of Salisbury at the end of the Civil War.  The Shober Bridge is cited as a contributing structure in the inventory taken to establish the Ellis Street Graded School District as a National Historic District. 


The City of Salisbury is marketed as 'Historic Salisbury'.  When citizens wish to demolish, upgrade, or modernize an historic home, they must go through a highly defined process through the City's Historic Preservation Commission.  Often, if our plans do not coincide with the original structure's design elements and materials, our requests are denied.  Our City Council members, newly elected, ran on platforms and spoke at forums supporting the City's historic neighborhoods, the jewels in Salisbury's crown, and the establishment of accompanying preservation plans. Yet now, the City is moving with head-spinning swiftness to abolish the existing historic Shober Bridge, without so much as a nod to the Historic Preservation Commission.  There is no engineered design in place yet, only a sketched plan to spend money on a new bridge.  This begins to ring of rhetoric.


The citizenry of the City of Salisbury needs voices to support the rehabilitation and restoration of this historic bridge in the heart of a historic district, a rather obvious omission in the City's plans.  The Historic Neighborhoods Alliance urges you to write to City Council, who has formed a committee to make recommendations on this bridge, and express the obvious benefits of restoring and preserving the Shober Bridge, over demolition and restructuring:

• Restoration of Shober Bridge is less costly to the City than demolition and rebuilding a new bridge.
• Restoration of Shober Bridge allows the City to honestly and with integrity claim itself 'Historic Salisbury'.
• Restoration of Shober Bridge preserves this uniquely designed bridge, few of which can be found in the State of North Carolina.
• Restoration of Shober Bridge preserves the character and nature of a historic neighborhood whose homes and architecture date back to the late 1800's.
• Restoration of Shober Bridge preserves this historic site for generations to come.

In addition to the marked change the demolition and new bridge will make on the neighborhood and the City, the rebuild project is estimated to take a couple of years.  If you have not already driven down the Fulton Street corridor to see how the current temporary Shober Bridge closing is impacting traffic, you ought to take a look.  To close the Shober Bridge for years, and thereby close off the Ellis Street corridor, one of only three railroad overpasses in downtown Salisbury, makes no sense for the greater good of the public when renovation will take only months - not years - for completion.


You can make your voices heard by addressing letters to City Council and/or addressing letters to the editor at the Salisbury Post.  Additionally, City Council meetings held the 1st and 3rd Tuesday of every month allow an open forum at the end of the planned agenda.  Citizens have 3 minutes to speak on a topic of their choice.  In 3 minutes or less, you can say, "I, a citizen of Historic Salisbury, support renovation and restoration of the Shober Bridge.  I do not support demolition and the restructuring of a new bridge at this historic site. Thank you Council Members."


Please step forward to preserve the historic nature of our structures, our neighborhoods, and ultimately our City. 


Thank you.

City Council Candidates Forum

The Historic Neighborhood Alliance is pleased and proud to deliver a huge THANK YOU to all who came out yesterday evening to attend the first inaugural HNA Candidates Forum held at the historic Salisbury Depot (pictured here in a 1907 postcard). It was a smash success with over 100 attendees, the largest assembled forum yet on the campaign trail! The questions posed to the candidates were indeed tough and thought-provoking. The answers to the questions, or the lack there-of, were most illuminating. Although here & there some missed the point of a question, others did an A+ job of not only answering but demonstrating that they had done their homework. In addition, the candidates had the opportunity to reveal something about themselves - an alternate goal of the event.

We learned a few things about amplifying and echoes in a large acoustic hall such as the Historic Depot. The entire event was video taped so if anyone needs clarification on any of the responses, the HNA may be able to get transcripts in the near future.

This was a true grassroots movement to get our City Council, incumbents or not, to THINK about the pressing issues their historic districts face EVERY DAY! Salisbury's Historic Neighborhoods are the jewels in her crown. We sincerely hope the candidates understand the issues that are unique to the historic districts ~ A Preservation Plan above and beyond the Land Ordinance, the 2020 Plan, and the Downtown Master Plan ~ Tougher ordinance language and enforcement to address the demolition-by-neglect syndrome ~ and the installation of a Housing Commission with a Rental Property registration and inspection program to protect both landlords and renters, to ensure minimum housing standards, and to address any criminal activity in a more consistent manner.



Be sure to place your informed vote this election! Absentee voting by mail opened October 2nd and continues. Thursday, 10/15/09, voters can come to the One-Stop Early Voting Site at the Rowan County Board of Elections, 130 W. Innes Street, Salisbury, NC to vote early for the upcoming Municipal Election. Hours will be from 8 a.m. until 5 p.m.