A Guide to the Best of Southern California : LANDMARKS : Olden Arches

Southern California’s notable bridges tend to be small, intimate affairs, their presence rarely betrayed by road signs. They lay out of sight of most of the workaday world, tucked into secluded canyons, modestly arching over little-known arroyos, connecting somewhere to somewhere else on quiet roads.

The bridge over the Hollywood Reservoir is also the dam that made it, and a walk along its serpentine summit serves up a variety of unmatched vistas. On the dry side, you’ll see a pine- and chaparral-covered ravine, then the big city, in all its smoggy glory. Opposite is the tranquil blue expanse of water. The bridge, designed in the ‘20s by William Mulholland, sports graceful arches and buttresses, and the faces of California bears appear on the facade. “I’m always amazed at how few people come here,” says local resident Monique Limery-Lewis, who often rides her bicycle through this oasis on Mulholland Drive. “Then again,” she adds, thinking it over, “it’s quite nice that way.”

“Like jewels of many hues set in a band/The Picture Bridge is studded with delights/Of beauty chosen from this blessed land. . . .” These words by poet laureate Robert Blanding adorn a breathtaking 79-year-old redwood footbridge on the grounds of the Ritz-Carlton in Pasadena. Triangular oil paintings were installed in each of the gables in 1933, making this the only covered picture bridge in America. Each piece depicts one of California’s scenic treasures--Torrey Pines, Red Rock Canyon, the Carmel Mission, even the Picture Bridge itself--and a few lines of Blanding’s verse extol their virtues on adjacent plaques.

Literary in name only, Los Feliz’s Shakespeare Bridge does, however, offer myriad visual charms. Classical arched balustrades run alongside the 262-foot-long reinforced concrete structure built in 1926, and Gothic turrets rise, steeple-like, at each end. Underneath, massive supporting arches belie the cuteness you see topside. Peer over the south side to take in another architectural wonder, the pinwheel-like pavilions of the Lautner School. At night, old-fashioned lamps bathe the bridge, at Franklin Avenue and St. George Street, in an otherworldly glow.

Few who travel Mission Canyon Road in Santa Barbara realize they cross over the oldest masonry arch bridge in Southern California. The Mission Canyon Road Bridge, which celebrated without fanfare its 100th anniversary last year, rises a mere 24 feet above Mission Canyon Creek. A charming, albeit diminutive, landmark with irregular stone walls extending from each end, it is eclipsed by the neighboring Santa Barbara Mission and Rocky Nook Park in the city’s history-rich El Pueblo Viejo.