It connects Downtown Dallas and West Dallas, paralleling the 2012 Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge for vehicles, and the 1930 Texas and Pacific Railway Trinity River Bridge.

Constructed as the Lamar-McKinney Viaduct in 1933, the original road bridge was built to carry vehicles across the periodically swelling Trinity River to West Dallas.

It was renamed in honor of the first African-American mayor of Dallas, Ronald Kirk.

[3] The Ronald Kirk Bridge reopened on Sunday, June 15, 2014 (Father's Day).

It opened with a playground, a splash park, lounge chairs, human-sized chess boards, and a ceiling of cloth to shade the area, along with many trails surrounding the bridge in the Trinity River Basin and on the levees.