Carries I‑26 / US 74 Maintained by NCDOT Height 69 m | Named for Peter Guice Opened 1972 Total length 320 m | |
Design Steel continuous, girder and floorbeam system Owner North Carolina Department of Transportation Similar Fred G Redmon Bridge, Poinsett Bridge, Campbell's Covered Bridge, Mills River Chapel, Carl Sandburg Home Na | ||
The Peter Guice Memorial Bridge consists of dual two-lane automobile bridges carrying I-26/US 74 across the Green River, located between East Flat Rock and Saluda, in Henderson County, North Carolina. Surpassed only by the Phil G. McDonald Bridge in West Virginia and the Emlenton Bridge in Pennsylvania, it is the third-highest bridge carrying an Interstate Highway in the eastern United States at 225 feet (69 m) tall. Each bridge is 1,050 feet (320 m) long and 28 feet (8.5 m) wide with two 12-foot (3.7 m) lanes and 2-foot (0.61 m) shoulders. In 1997, the both bridges were rehabilitated.
The bridge is dedicated to the memory of Peter Guice, who built the first toll bridge over the Green River in 1820; it replaced a hazardous ford along Howard Gap Road. An unrecorded flood washed out the toll bridge, but was replaced by his son; the second toll bridge was destroyed by flood in 1916. The current bridge is located high above where the former bridges once stood.