Total bridges
93
Public highway bridges in Stark County
County profile · official public datasets
Stark County, IL
93 public highway bridges tracked in the FHWA National Bridge Inventory: 57% rated Good, 37.6% Fair, 5.4% Poor.
- 93
- Public bridges
- 57%
- Good condition
- 5.4%
- Poor condition
The verdict
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory.
Stark County posts a top-quartile lowest Poor-condition share among rated counties in the state across rated county bridge inventory.
- Top 20%
- lowest Poor share in state
- 5.4%
- Poor-condition share
- 93
- public highway bridges
- 1983
- avg year built
Poor is an FHWA condition category from the lowest applicable component rating (4 or below), not a live crossing-safety or closure decision. Rankings cover counties with at least five public highway bridges.
Stark County Bridge Snapshot
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory, Stark County ranks #20 of 102 Illinois counties with at least 5 public highway bridges on Poor-condition share (lower share ranks better; currently 5.4%). Stark County, Illinois contains 93 public highway bridges. Roughly 57% are rated “Good,” 37.6% “Fair,” and 5.4% “Poor.” Poor means the lowest applicable deck, superstructure, substructure, or culvert rating is 4 or below on the 0–9 NBI scale. It is a condition category, not a live safety or closure decision.
Responsible agencies inspect covered bridges on risk-based intervals under current NBIS rules and submit inventory data to FHWA annually. The list below shows every NBI-tracked bridge in the county. Use the “Sort by” controls to change the ordering, and click any row for its reported inspection date, traffic count, and condition fields.
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory. See methodology for full definitions.
Good condition
57%
53 of 93 rated 7-9
Fair condition
37.6%
35 of 93 rated 5-6
Poor condition
5.4%
5 of 93 rated 4 or below
In-state Poor-share rank
#20 of 102
Among Illinois counties with 5+ bridges, lower share ranks better
Condition distribution
Share of 93 NBI-tracked bridges by lowest applicable component rating.
Good 57% (53)
Fair 37.6% (35)
Poor 5.4% (5)
Stark County's Poor-condition bridges carry 2,400 vehicle crossings a day
That is 6.7% of the county's reported daily bridge traffic on 5.4% of its bridges: Poor-condition structures carry more traffic than their share of the inventory. Each Poor bridge averages 480 crossings a day against 178 for a Good-condition one. A Poor rating is a condition category, not a closure or a live safety judgement; it means the lowest applicable component rating is 4 or below.
Computed over the 93 of 93 bridges in this county that report an average daily traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
21.5% of Stark County's bridges have passed the 50-year mark
20 of the 93 bridges with a recorded construction year were built in 1974 or earlier. Age alone is not a defect: a well-maintained older bridge can rate Good, and 57% of this county's inventory does. Even so, this older cohort is the population from which future Poor ratings are drawn, which is why the age profile below matters alongside the condition split above.
Cutoff derives from the 2024 release year minus a 50-year design life. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
One structure carries 66.7% of the county's Poor-condition bridge traffic
IL 17/91 over SPOON RIVER, built 1924, carries 1,600 vehicles a day, the most of any Poor-rated structure here. The county's Poor-condition exposure is concentrated rather than evenly spread, so the 5-bridge count understates how much of the daily burden sits on a single crossing.
Share is of the 2,400 daily crossings on Poor-rated bridges that report a traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
When Stark County's bridges were built
93 bridges with a recorded construction year, grouped by decade
- pre-1900 1
Built before 1900
1 bridges
- 1900s 4
1900–1909
4 bridges
- 1910s 1
1910–1919
1 bridges
- 1920s 1
1920–1929
1 bridges
- 1940s 2
1940–1949
2 bridges
- 1950s 6
1950–1959
6 bridges
- 1960s 4
1960–1969
4 bridges
- 1970s 5
1970–1979
5 bridges
- 1980s
1980–1989
27 bridges
- 1990s
1990–1999
17 bridges
- 2000s
2000–2009
15 bridges
- 2010s 9
2010–2019
9 bridges
- 2020s 1
2020–2029
1 bridges
What this shows Construction peaked in the 1980s, when 27 of the county's bridges still in the inventory were built, which is 29% of those with a recorded year. That cohort is now 35 to 44 years old in the 2024 inventory. Its average build year (1983) matches the Illinois average (1979).
How Stark County compares with Illinois's closest counties by inventory size
The 5 Illinois counties nearest Stark County in number of bridges, with their condition splits. Its 5.4% Poor share is the 1st-lowest of these 6. Its average build year of 1983 against a peer-group mean of 1982 is in line with the group.
Showing the 5 closest of 101 Illinois counties eligible for comparison.
| County | Bridges | Good | Fair | Poor | Avg. built |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Scott County | 99 | 54.5% | 38.4% | 7.1% | 1983 |
| Alexander County | 93 | 26.9% | 64.5% | 8.6% | 1981 |
| Stark County (this page) | 93 | 57% | 37.6% | 5.4% | 1983 |
| Menard County | 89 | 40.4% | 49.4% | 10.1% | 1980 |
| Wabash County | 89 | 61.8% | 32.6% | 5.6% | 1983 |
| Pope County | 88 | 63.6% | 29.5% | 6.8% | 1983 |
Each share is of that county's own total tracked bridges; peers are the counties with 5 or more bridges whose inventory size is closest to Stark County's. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
Nationwide counties with similar inventory size or average build year
Two NBI-derived peer sets for Stark County, both outside Illinois so the neighborhoods are not the same-state size table above.
Similar inventory size
Nearest county inventories outside IL (93 bridges here).
- Baker County, FL · 93 bridges
- Banks County, GA · 93 bridges
- Haralson County, GA · 93 bridges
- Cumberland County, KY · 93 bridges
Similar average build year
Nearest mean year-built outside IL (1983 here).
- Dallas County, TX · avg 1983 · 3,230 bridges
- Bexar County, TX · avg 1983 · 2,342 bridges
- Sedgwick County, KS · avg 1983 · 1,333 bridges
- Bernalillo County, NM · avg 1983 · 496 bridges
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release. Peers floor at 10 bridges so stub inventories cannot own the match.
Poor-condition bridges (5)
FAS 1372-CH 13
PoorOver: CAMP RUN CREEK
NW COR-17-T12NR7E, Stark, IL
Built 1959 Load: 0.0 t ADT: 650
TR 173
PoorOver: STREAM
SW COR-27-T12NR6E, Stark, IL
Built 1893 Load: 0.0 t ADT: 25
IL 17/91
PoorOver: SPOON RIVER
.6 MI W OF WYOMING, Stark, IL
Built 1924 Load: 9.7 t ADT: 1,600
TR 141
PoorOver: SPOON RIVER
E.CTR-10-T12N RGE, Stark, IL
Built 1983 Load: 19.4 t ADT: 75
TR 151
PoorOver: CAMP RUN
SW COR-1-T12NR7E, Stark, IL
Built 1980 Load: 34.0 t ADT: 50
Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.
Related
Data sourced from official public datasets. See our methodology for details. Retrieved and formatted by PlainBridges
Every figure on PlainBridges is rendered directly from federal source data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page draws directly on federal source data, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. NBI condition categories reflect the latest reported inventory record, not a live safety, closure, or travel decision.