I'm gonna say it's probably a case of level of detail loss. I bet the areas you can see from the bridge (and hey, if you haven't yet, you should totally look around when the Duty is over sometime, the stuff going on Outside the Bridge is pretty cool and worth at least one look) aren't going to be exactly to detail but to give you a sense of 'That's where X is' in relation to the Bridge when you get there later.

You can actually see the other side of the Steel Vigil from the Bridge even!