Wilmington Rail Viaduct

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999.

From the record

“The Wilmington Rail Viaduct is a series of fills and bridges, about 4 miles (6.4 km) long, that carries the Northeast Corridor through the city of Wilmington, Delaware, above street level. Constructed between 1902 and 1908, the structure consists principally of fills supported by heavy stone retaining walls, punctuated with plate girder bridges over streets, and augmented by a few sections of brick arch viaduct.”
Wikipedia article Wilmington Rail Viaduct, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 411 National Register listings published here for New Castle County · listed in 1999 · category: Structure.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

Address. Amtrak's NE corridor through Wilmington, Wilmington, 19801
When was it listed? November 1999
Category. structure
Census division. Wilmington
National Register reference number. 99001276 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

3 since 2004

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 3 fires within 5 miles of Wilmington Rail Viaduct between 2004 and 2017, burning about 1 acre in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	2
Equipment and vehicle use	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
19 April 2017	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	New Jersey Forest Fire Service	not named
20 November 2004	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
10 November 2004	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named

Every fire recorded in New Castle County

Mines and quarries near this property

5 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 5 workings within 5 miles of Wilmington Rail Viaduct: 3 plants, 2 past producers. 3 still produce. What was taken out: Chromium, Titanium, Fluorine-Fluorite, Titanium, Pigment. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
American Minerals/ Wilmington, De.	Chromium	Past Producer
Edgemoor Plant Ti	Titanium, Pigment	Plant	1956
Wilmington Plant Dupont	Titanium	Plant
Wilmington Plantozark-Mahoning	Fluorine-Fluorite	Plant
Winzinger Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer

Every working recorded in New Castle County

Storms near this property

31 since 1995

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Wilmington, the town this property stands in, in 31 storm reports between 1995 and 2026: 16 thunderstorm wind, 6 hail, 3 flood, 3 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
June 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	$25,000	A severe thunderstorm knocked down a couple of trees in Wilmington.
June 2025	Lightning	Wilmington	$1,000	Multiple structure fire reports near Wilmington due to lightning strikes. Time estimated.
March 2026	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	Downed tree in Wilmington blocking an exit off I-95 Northbound. Downed tree limbs also reported in neighborhoods nearby. Time estimated from radar.
March 2026	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	Numerous reports of tree damage and powerlines down across the city of Wilmington. Time estimated.
June 2023	Flash Flood	Wilmington	-	Governor Printz Boulevard was closed in Edgemoor between Lea Boulevard and Edgemoor Road due to flooding.
July 2021	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	A couple reports were received of downed wires near 10th St. Time estimated from radar.
August 2020	Flash Flood	Wilmington	-	East 12th Street was closed at Interstate 495 in Wilmington due to flooding.
April 2020	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	A couple reports of tree limbs and wires down in the area. Time estimated from radar.
August 2020	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	Trees down or snapped on North Madison Street between West 9th and West 10th streets in Wilmington. Time estimated from radar.
February 2016	Flood	Wilmington	-	The Brandywine river flooded the afternoon of 2/25 due to heavy rain from the night before. The Brandywine State park had flooding in the parking lot starting around 11am. The local museum further upstream also was closed for the day. Some high water was also noted at the local zoo.
April 2015	Flash Flood	Wilmington	-	Thunderstorms with heavy rain caused flash flooding along 12th Street near the Brandywine Creek in Wilmington. Vehicles were stuck in flood waters on that roadway. No serious injuries were reported. Event precipitation totals since the morning of the 20th included 2.83 inches at the New Castle County Airport, 2.81 inches in Newport, 2.52 inches in Newark and 2.40 inches in Hockessin.
July 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	A severe thunderstorm knocked down trees and wires in Wilmington.
June 2012	Hail	Wilmington	-	A thunderstorm dropped nickel-size hail in Wilmington.
August 2011	Hail	Wilmington	-	Quarter size hail fell from a severe thunderstorm in Wilmington.
September 2011	Flood	Wilmington	-	The Brandywine Creek at Wilmington was above its 16.5 foot flood stage from 915 a.m. EDT through 1141 a.m. EDT on the 8th. It crested at 16.7 feet at 1015 a.m. EDT on the 8th.
May 2010	Hail	Wilmington	-	Nickel to quarter size hail fell in Wilmington. In northern Wilmington, the hail briefly covered the ground.
March 2009	Hail	Wilmington	-	Dime to nickel size hail fell in northeastern New Castle County in Wilmington and Brandywine Hundred.
June 2009	Hail	Wilmington	-	The same severe thunderstorm dropped penny size hail in Wilmington.
August 2008	Heavy Rain	Wilmington	-	Thunderstorms with heavy rain caused poor drainage flooding that entered a couple of basement apartments at the Dana Apartments on North Tatnall Street. About a dozen residents were evacuated from two basement apartments. Three apartments and families above the flooded apartments were also displaced because the electricity was turned off. The building sits lower than the street. Adjusted for hail Doppler Radar storm total estimates were between one inch and an inch and a quarter.
October 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	A severe thunderstorm caused wind damage to the Pike Creek Shopping Center in the Prices Corner area of New Castle County. Extensive roof damaged occurred in the strip mall with Eckerd Drug, Buster Brown and Carousel Cards hit the hardest. In surrounding areas the severe thunderstorm caused slight wind damage to two buildings in the Goldey-Beacom College. Snapped and downed trees took down wires and caused power outages to about 4,000 persons.
February 2008	Flood	Wilmington	-	no account filed
July 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	no account filed
July 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	no account filed
September 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	no account filed
August 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	no account filed
June 2001	Hail	Wilmington	-	no account filed
March 2000	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	no account filed
August 1999	Lightning	Wilmington	-	no account filed
August 1999	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	no account filed
July 1998	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	no account filed
June 1997	Thunderstorm Wind	Wilmington	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in New Castle County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Wilmington Amtrak Station	under 500 feet	1976
Old Asbury Methodist Church	0.2 miles	1976
Lower Market Street Historic District	0.2 miles	1980
Philips-Thompson Buildings	0.3 miles	1980
Lower Market Street Historic District (Boundary Increase)	0.3 miles	1985
Harlan and Hollingsworth Office Building	0.3 miles	1979

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 99001276 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
New Castle County	All 411 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.