Full Day Royal Gorge and Red Canyon Jeep Tour
A full day with a guide covering the geology and the 1870s railroad war — where the facts come from.
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Check Availability13 Surprising Facts About the Royal Gorge Bridge
The Royal Gorge Bridge is easy to take at face value – a big bridge over a big canyon. Its real story is stranger and older than that: a record-setting build in the depths of 1929, decades as the highest bridge on the planet, a wildfire that nearly erased the park around it, and a canyon carved from rock well over a billion years old. Here are the facts worth knowing before you cross, and if any of them make you want to see it up close, you can compare Royal Gorge Bridge tours that get you there.
The short answer
The Royal Gorge Bridge hangs about 956 feet above the Arkansas River, was built in seven months in 1929 as a tourist attraction rather than a crossing to anywhere, and held the record for the world’s highest bridge for more than half a century. It survived the 2013 Royal Gorge Fire that destroyed most of the park around it, and the roughly $30 million rebuild reopened in 2015 — which is why so much of what you walk through today is modern.
The bridge in numbers
| Measure | Figure |
|---|---|
| Height above the Arkansas River | About 956 ft |
| Year opened | 1929 |
| Time taken to build | About seven months |
| World’s highest bridge | From 1929 until 2001 |
| Highest suspension bridge in the US | Still, today |
| Age of the canyon rock | Roughly 1.7 billion years |
| Rebuild after the 2013 fire | About $30 million, reopened 2015 |
1. It is the highest suspension bridge in the United States
The deck sits about 956 feet above the Arkansas River. That is high enough that the river looks like a thread from the middle of the span, and it is the single fact that defines the experience of walking across.
2. It was once the highest bridge in the world
On completion in 1929 it claimed the world record, and it held that title for close to 75 years, until taller gorge crossings opened in China in the early 2000s. It no longer holds the world record, but it remains the highest of its kind in the country.
3. It was built in about seven months
Construction ran through 1929 with a crew of around 80 workers, and the bridge was dedicated that December. For a structure this size and this high, seven months was a remarkable pace, achieved without a single worker fatality during the main build.
4. One man financed it, another engineered it
The bridge was the idea of Texas businessman Lon Piper, who put up the money, and chief engineer George Cole, who designed and oversaw the work. It was built as a tourist attraction from the start, not as a river crossing anyone needed.
Did you know? The deck-laying crew wore special grip-soled shoes and were told to shuffle their feet and never look down as they worked hundreds of feet above the river.
5. It cost about $350,000 – including a railway that is gone
The final bill came to roughly $350,000, a figure that included an incline railway running down into the canyon beside the bridge. That railway was later damaged and is no longer in service; it was never rebuilt, which is why some older accounts describe a funicular you will not find on a visit today.
6. The deck has close to 1,300 planks
The walking surface is made of wooden planks – close to 1,300 of them – carried on steel beams between the towers. Individual planks are replaced as they wear, so the deck you walk has been renewed many times over even though the towers and main cables are original.
7. It was engineered to hold over two million pounds
The span was designed with a load capacity well beyond anything it carries in normal use, which is part of why it can hold a crowd of walkers and a lane of golf carts and still feel solid as it flexes.
8. A 2013 wildfire destroyed most of the park
In June 2013 the Royal Gorge Fire swept through, destroying 48 of the park's 52 buildings and about 90 percent of the grounds, including the original visitor center and aerial tram. The park was evacuated safely as the fire jumped the canyon walls.
9. The steel bridge survived the fire
The bridge itself came through. Because its towers and cables are steel, only about a hundred of its wooden planks were scorched, and the structure was reopened after inspection and repair. The span you walk is the same one dedicated in 1929.
10. It reopened in 2015 after a $30 million rebuild
Reconstruction reopened the park in 2015 with a new aerial gondola, a new zip line and a large new visitor center. The park you visit today is, in most respects, only about a decade old – wrapped around a bridge nearly a century older.
Useful tip: The Plaza Theater's short film covers much of this history. Watching it early in your visit makes the walk across the bridge land differently – you cross it knowing what it survived.
11. The canyon rock is about 1.7 billion years old
The Royal Gorge is cut into Precambrian granite and gneiss dated to roughly 1.7 billion years. The bridge is new by comparison – the rock beneath it is among the oldest exposed stone in Colorado.
12. The Arkansas River did the carving
The near-vertical walls were cut over a very long span of time by the Arkansas River, which still runs along the canyon floor almost a thousand feet below the deck. The same river carries the rafting trips that run through the gorge today.
Just how high is 956 feet?
Numbers on a page are hard to feel, so here is the scale: the deck stands high enough that a 70-storey building could sit beneath it with room to spare, and the river at the bottom looks like a pale ribbon from the centre of the span. It is that gap – between the solid deck underfoot and the enormous emptiness below the planks – that gives the crossing its particular grip on people who have walked plenty of ordinary bridges.
It is one of Colorado's original roadside attractions
The Royal Gorge Bridge belongs to an early era of American car tourism, built in 1929 to draw drivers off the highway to a spectacle they could not see anywhere else. That origin still shapes the visit: it was designed to be crossed for the experience, not to get anyone anywhere, which is why walking it – slowly, in the middle, looking down – is still the point.
The park around it keeps changing
While the span is nearly a century old, the attractions around it are much newer. The aerial gondola, the zip line and the visitor center all date from the post-2013 rebuild, and the Via Ferrata and other experiences have been added since, so the bridge you cross is a constant while the park it anchors continues to evolve. Two visits a few years apart can feel noticeably different everywhere except on the deck itself.
Seeing the history for yourself
Much of this story is on show during a visit. The Plaza Theater's short film walks through the build and the fire; the browned original cables and the newer grey wires of the 1980s rehabilitation are visible from the deck; and the age of the rock is written plainly in the canyon walls the gondola crosses. Reading the history before you go, then spotting it on site, is one of the quieter pleasures of the place.
13. It was trademarked "America's Bridge"
In 2019 the Royal Gorge Bridge was trademarked "America's Bridge," a nod to its place in the country's early tourist-attraction history. For the practical side of seeing it – tickets, hours and getting there – see our visitor information, or read our frequently asked questions.
To see the span from the deck and from the river in one day, compare the Royal Gorge Bridge Tours listings.
Tours that fit this trip
Chosen to match what this guide covers, not for what sells.
Colorado: All Aboard the Royal Gorge Route Railroad!
The railroad itself, running the canyon floor along the route that war was fought over.
From $148 per person
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Cañon City: Royal Gorge Bridge & Park Entry Ticket
The bridge, up close, 950 feet above the river the facts keep referring to.
From $35 per person
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