Total bridges
119
Public highway bridges in Sullivan County
County profile · official public datasets
Sullivan County, PA
119 public highway bridges tracked in the FHWA National Bridge Inventory: 43.7% rated Good, 47.1% Fair, 9.2% Poor.
- 119
- Public bridges
- 43.7%
- Good condition
- 9.2%
- Poor condition
The verdict
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory.
Sullivan County posts a better-than-median Poor-condition share among rated counties in the state across mid-size county bridge inventory.
- Top 31%
- lowest Poor share in state
- 9.2%
- Poor-condition share
- 119
- public highway bridges
- 1967
- 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.
Sullivan County Bridge Snapshot
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory, Sullivan County ranks #21 of 67 Pennsylvania counties with at least 5 public highway bridges on Poor-condition share (lower share ranks better; currently 9.2%). Sullivan County, Pennsylvania contains 119 public highway bridges. Roughly 43.7% are rated “Good,” 47.1% “Fair,” and 9.2% “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
43.7%
52 of 119 rated 7-9
Fair condition
47.1%
56 of 119 rated 5-6
Poor condition
9.2%
11 of 119 rated 4 or below
In-state Poor-share rank
#21 of 67
Among Pennsylvania counties with 5+ bridges, lower share ranks better
Condition distribution
Share of 119 NBI-tracked bridges by lowest applicable component rating.
Good 43.7% (52)
Fair 47.1% (56)
Poor 9.2% (11)
Sullivan County's Poor-condition bridges carry 2,019 vehicle crossings a day
That is 4% of the county's reported daily bridge traffic on 9.2% of its bridges: Poor-condition structures carry less traffic than their share of the inventory. Each Poor bridge averages 184 crossings a day against 338 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 119 of 119 bridges in this county that report an average daily traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
53.8% of Sullivan County's bridges have passed the 50-year mark
64 of the 119 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 43.7% 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 66.8% of the county's Poor-condition bridge traffic
SR 487 over OVER BIRCH CREEK, built 1900, carries 1,349 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 11-bridge count understates how much of the daily burden sits on a single crossing.
Share is of the 2,019 daily crossings on Poor-rated bridges that report a traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
When Sullivan County's bridges were built
119 bridges with a recorded construction year, grouped by decade
- pre-1900 2
Built before 1900
2 bridges
- 1900s 5
1900–1909
5 bridges
- 1920s
1920–1929
9 bridges
- 1930s
1930–1939
19 bridges
- 1940s 7
1940–1949
7 bridges
- 1950s
1950–1959
12 bridges
- 1960s 6
1960–1969
6 bridges
- 1970s
1970–1979
11 bridges
- 1980s
1980–1989
8 bridges
- 1990s
1990–1999
9 bridges
- 2000s
2000–2009
11 bridges
- 2010s
2010–2019
17 bridges
- 2020s 3
2020–2029
3 bridges
What this shows Construction peaked in the 1930s, when 19 of the county's bridges still in the inventory were built, which is 16% of those with a recorded year. That cohort is now 85 to 94 years old in the 2024 inventory. Its average build year (1967) matches the Pennsylvania average (1970).
How Sullivan County compares with Pennsylvania's closest counties by inventory size
The 5 Pennsylvania counties nearest Sullivan County in number of bridges, with their condition splits. Its 9.2% Poor share is the 2nd-lowest of these 6. Its average build year of 1967 against a peer-group mean of 1969 is in line with the group.
Showing the 5 closest of 66 Pennsylvania counties eligible for comparison.
| County | Bridges | Good | Fair | Poor | Avg. built |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pike County | 158 | 35.4% | 38.6% | 25.9% | 1971 |
| Wyoming County | 140 | 42.1% | 35% | 22.9% | 1973 |
| Carbon County | 134 | 20.9% | 60.4% | 18.7% | 1960 |
| Elk County | 127 | 39.4% | 49.6% | 11% | 1973 |
| Sullivan County (this page) | 119 | 43.7% | 47.1% | 9.2% | 1967 |
| Montour County | 108 | 50% | 44.4% | 5.6% | 1968 |
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 Sullivan 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 Sullivan County, both outside Pennsylvania so the neighborhoods are not the same-state size table above.
Similar inventory size
Nearest county inventories outside PA (119 bridges here).
- Carroll County, AR · 119 bridges
- Grant County, AR · 119 bridges
- Stafford County, KS · 119 bridges
- Grayson County, KY · 119 bridges
Similar average build year
Nearest mean year-built outside PA (1967 here).
- Los Angeles County, CA · avg 1967 · 3,547 bridges
- Sonoma County, CA · avg 1967 · 609 bridges
- Merced County, CA · avg 1967 · 528 bridges
- Shasta County, CA · avg 1967 · 492 bridges
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release. Peers floor at 10 bridges so stub inventories cannot own the match.
Good-condition bridges (52)
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.