EDMONTON -- Underneath the Whitemud Creek overpass lies a unique and relatively unknown, until recently, archway that wraps around a pedestrian bridge.
“I come here a lot,” one passerby told CTV News. “It's pretty nice.”
The Whitemud Creek arch was once a site for coal mining.
In 2005 the province added the pedestrian bridge as a means for people to safely traverse from one side of the freeway to the other. Below the bridge is the creek which allows wildlife to also make the safe trek.
Local blogger Lincoln Ho believes the project is incomplete and unsafe.
"Crumbling infrastructure is always an issue especially underneath one of the busiest roadways in the city," said Ho.
He believes that because of very little foot traffic, “urban explorers” are taking part in extensive and often profane graffiti tagging.
“They're climbing on to parts of the bridge that aren't for pedestrians,” says Ho. “Somebody is going to get hurt and it's very hard to access for medical personnel."
The crossing has also become a popular backdrop for social media posts, increasing its notoriety.
"So anybody who has featured this bridge on a TikTok has gotten very popular with it and so everybody is copying everybody else’s TikTok's and checking out this supposed hidden bridge."
Neither end of the bridge is connected by trail, making it difficult to access. Still, that isn’t stopping admirers from making the trek to this urban escape.
"I actually have a friend from Toronto coming to visit and I'm going to bring her here," said one woman out for a hike.
"It's a beautiful piece of infrastructure,” said Ho. “Beautiful contemporary architecture style in there and it is a shame that it's just left abandoned.”
