Swinging Bridge

Beautiful year round. I’ve always loved this place and this park and this street. I come back to it from time to time.. because in all the world there’s really only a few pedestrian suspension bridges like this and it’s great that they are preserved and maintained and still in use.

Our swinging bridges are iconic in our town! Fun to walk across the river during your walk in the park or if you want to get from the east side to the south side without walking thru town.

Very cool swinging bridge. We did not know about the parking near by. The family walked the bridge and then I found parking on the other end near the second bridge! Beautiful park to play at.

The most beautiful bridge in Pontiac 🍁🍂 In the fall this place is magical. Highly recommended. ❤️😊swinging bridge 🌉

Ah yes, welcome, traveler! It is I—the Pontiac Swinging Bridge. Yes, yes, that’s my official name, though honestly, I wish they’d left out the “swinging” part. Who in their right mind wants to dangle over the Vermilion River, wobbling and squeaking every time a curious soul dares set foot upon me? Do you enjoy your knees trembling like gelatin at a church picnic? Because I do not. I am a bridge. I was built to connect, to be sturdy, noble, reliable—not to flap about like a clothesline in a thunderstorm. Every day the good townsfolk stroll across me, and I don’t mind them. They’re gentle. They wave. Some even pat my railing as though I were a trusty old hound. That warms my planks. But then—the bikers. Oh, the bikers! Tires thundering across me like I’m some carnival ride, rattling my bolts, making me feel like my insides are going to unscrew themselves and plop into the river. Do you know what it’s like to be tickled against your will by knobby rubber tires? I do. And I hate it. And yet, I do my duty. I span the water. I carry the brave, the hesitant, the lemonade-holding wanderers who think, “Oh, what a quaint little bridge, let’s see what happens.” Lemonade, yes. I love it. Sweet, tart, refreshing—the only thing that could calm my nerves after a gaggle of giggling teenagers decide to jump up and down on me as if summoning demons from the riverbed. Sometimes I dream. I dream of being fixed—solidified—anchored so tightly that no soul could ever make me sway again. Or perhaps… I dream of swinging properly, gloriously, like a carnival ride on chains, swooping and soaring and scaring the trousers off anyone who dares cross. At least then I’d have purpose. Right now I live in that dreadful in-between: a bridge who swings, but only just enough to make people clutch their stomachs and mutter, “I don’t like this, I don’t like this at all.” It cost $1 Vermillion dollars to build me. Still, I am proud. I am Pontiac’s Swinging Bridge. A trembling, lemonade-loving, biker-disliking, wobble-prone oddity. Walk me if you dare. Cross me if you must. But for the love of all that’s holy, could someone either make me steady… or make me truly swing?