The year was 1931, and Fort Worth had underpass fever. The city and two railroads teamed up to build underpasses on Henderson, Jennings, and Main streets downtown (Texas & Pacific) and on Morningside Drive on the South Side (Missouri-Kansas-Texas). These underpasses remind us that even a slab of public transportation infrastructure as utilitarian as a railroad underpass can have style.
I give you exhibit A: the Missouri-Kansas-Texas (MKT or Katy) underpass on Morningside Drive near South Main Street (two blocks north of the site of the Battle of Buttermilk Junction in 1886).
Each side of the underpass wears the company badge. Few Fort Worth railroad structures retain such identifiers.
The shoulders of the underpass are arcaded piers.
Each side of the underpass has three torchlike iron sconces for approach lighting. All six are missing parts.
This bracket has become a bird townhouse.
The interior of the underpass also was lighted. This fixture retains its grille.
But this fuse box hasn’t protected a circuit in years.
You know, that’s odd to think the fuse box was in a location you could access, just shows the difference in the time it was built, and today
Bryan, I thought that myself. I could easily reach it. Maybe it was locked when it was live. But even then it could be vandalized.