[3] In 1923, the city of Detroit and Grand Trunk Western Railroad began a plan to build 22 grade separations; both parties agreed to share the cost.

These tracks ran from the northwest, where they connected with a network of other lines, to the southeast, where the tracks turned to parallel the river and supplied a number of large factories, including the Detroit-Michigan Stove Plant, the United States Rubber Company Plant, and the Parke-Davis Laboratories.

The tracks terminated at the Brush Street Depot in downtown Detroit.

[3] By March 1930, sixteen of the crossings of what now is known as the "Dequindre Cut" were finished, including the nearby Chestnut Street Bridge.

The bridge is good evidence of the grade separation effort early in the twentieth century.