1864 swing: (Bridge Hunter, date is from BridgesNYC)
1904 rolling: (Bridge Hunter)
1926 lift: (Bridge Hunter; no Historic Bridges; HAER; Satellite)CNJ = Central Railroad of New Jersey or Jersey Central
"Built 1926; site of Newark Bay Bridge Accident in 1958; damaged in ship collision 1966; railroad abandoned 1978; lift spans demolished 1980, approach spans demolished 1988." [Bridge Hunter]
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| Brendan J Dock shared HAER NJ,7-NEARK,16--40 The last passenger train crossed the bridge was on August 6, 1978. on July 11, 1980 explosives were used to partially demolish the bridge. The vertical lift spans and towers fell, engulfed in smoke. The approaches and remaining trestles were removed in 1987-1988, leaving only portions of the piers along the shorelines as visual reminders of the structure that once crossed the bay. Could desperately use it today, although in the last years only one side worked. Newark went all out to save the bridge as it was a viable train route between Jersey City and Newark. But the Coast Guard was hellbent on taking it down as a Navigational hazard. There was something fishy about the whole thing considering how many people tried to save it. Charlie Smith it wasn’t only between those places , it was a vital link beyond. Today the ship traffic is not as intense.That was another big mistake that somebody made a lot of money on destroying that bridge........ It looks like one track was already taken out because it looks like there is only one lift bridge (on the right) or am I wrong? I can't tell if Jersey City is to the right or we are looking west to Elizabethport. Ira Ginsburg yes it was hit and never repaired |
Significance: The Newark Bay Bridge was constructed near the end of J.A.L. Waddell's career. He was an early proponent of the vertical lift bridge, designing and building his first in 1892. Waddell's landmark book, Bridge Engineering, published in 1916, deals specifically with vertical lift bridges (Chapter XXXI). He predicted a widespread utilization of the type, a projection that was not proven true. The Newark Bay Bridge, a dual track bridge with double lift spans (one of 210' 9" and the second of 299'), was constructed after 30 years of experience for Waddell. [HAER]
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| Geoff Hubbs, Oct 1974 via Bridge Hunter, License: Released into public domain [The bridge was across the mouth of the bay and it was 1.4 miles long.] |
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Photo from Pinterest, License: Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike (CC BY-SA) Bob Fasco posted The 1958 Newark Bay rail accident occurred on September 15, 1958 in Newark Bay, New Jersey, United States, when a Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ) morning commuter train, #3314, ran through a restricting and a stop signal, derailed, and slid off the open Newark Bay lift bridge. Both diesel locomotives and the first two coaches plunged into Newark Bay and sank immediately, killing 48 people and injuring the same number. A third coach, snagged by its rear truck (bogie), hung precariously off the bridge for two hours before it also toppled into the water. As the locomotive crew was killed, the cause of the accident was never determined nor reinvestigated. Michael Pignatelli: They demolished that one around 1980. |
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| HAER NJ,7-NEARK,16--46 46. VIEW LOOKING SOUTH WITH VESSEL SEALAND GALLOWAY IN FOREGROUND SHOWING NAVIGATIONAL PROBLEM - Central Railroad of New Jersey, Newark Bay Lift Bridge, Spanning Newark Bay, Newark, Essex County, NJ [Note the Bayonne Bridge in the background.] |
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HAER NJ,7-NEARK,16--4747. AERIAL VIEW LOOKING SOUTH AND SHOWING SEALAND GALLOWAY - Central Railroad of New Jersey, Newark Bay Lift Bridge, Spanning Newark Bay, Newark, Essex County, NJ |
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HAER NJ,7-NEARK,16--4848. VIEW LOOKING NORTHWEST WITH SEALAND GALLOWAY Photograph 49 enlarged print - Central Railroad of New Jersey, Newark Bay Lift Bridge, Spanning Newark Bay, Newark, Essex County, NJ |
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| HAER NJ,7-NEARK,16--42 42. VIEW LOOKING NORTH AT BOTH 216' AND 135' DRAW OPENINGS - Central Railroad of New Jersey, Newark Bay Lift Bridge, Spanning Newark Bay, Newark, Essex County, NJ (Douglas Butler posted a copyrighted version of this image.) |
1904 Scherzer Rolling Bridges
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| archive, p109 via BridgeHunter-1904 |
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| archive, p108 via BridgeHunter-1904 |
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| Postcard via BridgeHunter-1904, Circa 1912 |
A key advantage of a rolling bridge over a swing bridge is that it does not have to open all of the way to allow passage of barges and other low marine traffic. [BridgesNYC]
1864 Swing Bridge
We can't see it in this photo, but the rest of the bridge was a wooden trestle. And the rolling spans would allow expansion from two to four tracks by adding parallel rolling spans. The 85' rolling spans were replaced by 200' and 125' lift spans with a maximum clearance of 135'. Newark and Jersey City wanted a tunnel instead of a bridge, but that would have been $100m instead of $9m. The minimum clearance of the lift spans was 35' so that 60% of the marine traffic could pass without interfering with train traffic. The actual cost was $14m. [BridgesNYC, this includes a brief history of the CNJ beginning in 1831.] |
| MysticSeaport via BridgeHunter-1864 |
Wow, This is too old for me. I like these old stories of rusty bridges, or, yeah, kinda a cool real tale story about this “railroad bridge”.
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