page_title: Cochecton–Damascus Bridge
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Cochecton–Damascus Bridge / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Old Cochecton–Damascus Bridge, seen from Cochecton, NY, USA side of Delaware River
context_page_description: The Cochecton–Damascus Bridge, sometimes called the Cochecton Dam Road Bridge, crosses the Delaware River in the United States between the unincorporated hamlet of Cochecton, in Sullivan County, New York, and Damascus Township, in Wayne County, Pennsylvania. On the Pennsylvania side it is the eastern terminus of State Route 371; in New York its approach road is County Route 114. It was built in 1950; bridges have crossed the river at that point since 1819.
  Those early bridges replaced ferry services that had to replace them when they collapsed or were washed away during floods. By the late 19th century a private company had built a toll bridge at the site which proved stable. It was eventually bought by a joint commission established by both states, which abolished the toll. A lawsuit against New York over the construction of the current bridge ended in a holding that the state itself could be sued over actions of the commission since that body was not sufficiently distinct from the state, and sovereign immunity did not apply.
context_section_description: In 1801, following the incorporation of the village of Newburgh, the Newburgh and Cochecton Turnpike company was formed to build that road, connecting the Hudson River port city with the Delaware Valley and the forest products harvested there. Settlement of the region, previously limited to only a few communities along the river, grew so quickly that Sullivan County was formed in 1809. By 1810 it was complete, its route following what is today State Route 17K, the county roads that were once State Route 17 before the Quickway expressway was built, and State Route 17B to County Route 114.
  On the Pennsylvania side the road continued as the Cochecton and Great Bend Turnpike. Travelers at first crossed the Delaware via ferry services that had existed under royal charters since before the Revolution. In 1817 construction of the first bridge began; the 550-foot (170 m) wooden structure, supported by a single pier midriver, opened two years later. Due to the patriotic atmosphere that prevailed following the recent War of 1812, all members of the military crossing the bridge were exempt from the toll.
  The poorly designed bridge soon collapsed into the river. Ferry service resumed until a second bridge was built in 1821 with a sturdier design. It lasted until 1846 when another flood damaged it too severely to use. Ferries again took over until a covered bridge could be designed and built. The turnpikes ceased collecting tolls around 1850; the companies that ran them dissolved themselves after the Civil War, turning the roads over to the towns (in New York) and townships (in Pennsylvania) in which they were located. Cochecton and Damascus continued to thrive, since the bridge was the only one carrying a road over the Delaware for 30 miles (48 km) in either direction until the 1890s, when the Callicoon Bridge was built. The Damascus Historic District and, on the New York side, Parsonage Road in Cochecton, are both listed on the National Register of Historic Places as they contain many extant buildings from this era.
  The mid-19th-century bridge was still in use, the oldest bridge then on the Delaware, when it was washed all the way down to the Narrowsburg–Darbytown Bridge, then the rail bridge at Tusten, in the floods of 1902. Its replacement was a steel bridge that served all the way through the creation of the New York–Pennsylvania Joint Interstate Bridge Commission in the 1910s, which gradually acquired the bridges and made them free at the same time as the route of the old turnpikes was being added to the highway networks of both states. By the middle of the century the bridge was showing the effect of carrying far more automotive traffic between the states than had been thought possible at the time of its construction, and the commission moved to replace it. In 1950 New York's Department of Public Works, acting on the commission's recommendation, awarded the $750,000 contract for a new bridge to Thomas D'Angelo, a Binghamton sole proprietor who did business as Triple Cities Construction. It was built 300 feet (100 m) downriver from its predecessor; one of the original abutments remains on the Pennsylvania side and the residential power line across the river still follows the old bridge's path.
  Construction was completed, and the bridge opened, in 1952. Two years later, D'Angelo sued the state over unpaid monies arising from the work. The state moved to have the case dismissed for lack of jurisdiction, arguing that he should have really sued the commission as the party which was ultimately responsible for initiating the work. And he could not sue the commission, the state claimed, since it was covered by the sovereign immunity of not only New York but Pennsylvania, which New York had not waived on its behalf and could not waive on Pennsylvania's behalf. It cited similar holdings in cases brought against the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
  New York's Court of Claims, which hears civil cases against the state, was not convinced. The statute that created the commission authorized one or both states to enter into contract
caption: The early 20th-century bridge, seen from Cochecton
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