This page features the Grey Cloud Island Bridge. It is one of three bridges that cross a side channel of the Mississippi River in Cottage Grove, Minnesota, to provide access to Grey Cloud Island. Grey Cloud Island is a large island in the Mississippi River between Hastings and Saint Paul.

Grey Cloud island sits in a corner of the river where the Mississippi River makes a sharp curve from flowing east and west near Hastings to flowing north and south upriver as far as downtown Saint Paul. While Saint Paul Park and Cottage Grove have seen rapid development, the area near and on Grey Cloud Island is still relatively rural. In fact, most of the island is dominated by two very large sand and gravel operations.

The Grey Cloud Island Bridge consists of a causeway and box culvert on Geneva Avenue at approximately River Mile 822.5. The bridge is barely visible from the road. In fact, as the photo above shows, the best vantage point to see the bridge is by looking upstream from the Grey Cloud Trail Bridge.

This area has seen a number of floods in past years. A recent repair project stabilized the causeway by adding fill and rip-rap to the sides of the roadway. To protect the bridge, sheet pile was driven in along the wings of the bridge, forming much bigger wings able to support the wider causeway.

The photo above is a view of the causeway taken from the northwest end of the causeway. The photo below is a view of the bridge and causeway as seen from traffic level. One can see a car parked along the causeway. This is a very popular place for fishermen to park and fish the Grey Cloud Channel.