Moyie Springs, Idaho — Bridge Works So Well You Can Miss the Canyon

Most people meet Moyie Springs at highway speed.

U.S. 2 approaches the Moyie River, the ground abruptly falls away and a bridge carries traffic across a canyon that seems considerably larger than the city beside it.

The river established the route long before engineers arrived. Indigenous travelers, miners, timber workers and railroads all had to negotiate the same cut through the mountains.

Timber gave the modern community much of its economy, with surrounding forests feeding mills and wood-products operations.

The bridge is the clearest explanation of the place.

It is an expensive human answer to a river that put a canyon directly across an east-west route. Moyie Springs is easy to pass without noticing precisely because the answer works.