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| 2019 Photo by Geoff Hubbs via BridgeHunter, License: Released into public domain looking south from Astoria |
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| Michael Quartararo posted Triborough Bridge, with the Hell Gate Bridge peeking in on the left, New York City |
The bridge was originally designed for two decks and four main cables, similar to the Manhattan Bridge. It was begun by the city on the eve of the Depression, and then taken over by the newly-formed Triborough Bridge Authority for completion after a re-design. If you look at the tower foundations, you can see where the middle pair of legs was to go. Torched-off eyebars also still exist inside the anchorages. This double-deck plan also likely influenced the retention of the truss design. [PRJ's comment]PRJ's comment explains the "bump" in the middle on the pier.
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| Jeffrey Gluck posted Hell Gate span of the Robert F. Kennedy (Triborough) Bridge (I-278) |
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| Mark Gereg posted The triborough bridge from the hell gate bridge. |
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| 1936 Associated Press via BridgeHunter 1936--Triborough bridge under construction, Hells Gate RR bridge in background |
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| Underestimated Arsenal posted "For two years the foundations stood stark and bare," Engineering News-Record wrote in August 1935 of the Triborough Bridge in New York City. Those foundations had been built for a bigger bridge than the one in this photograph. New York City started the job in the fall of 1929. Over a little more than two years it built the piers for the two towers of a suspension bridge across the East River, the cores of the anchorages that would hold its cables at each end, and the footings for a viaduct on Wards Island. The plan was a bridge with four main cables, two roadways to start with, and an upper deck to be added later. The tower foundations and the anchorages were built for that four-cable bridge. Then, in the spring of 1932, the city ran out of money for it, and the work stopped. It started again with a federal loan agreement signed on September 1, 1933. In November a contract was let for the steel towers, and the fabricators began making them: towers with four legs each, to carry four cables. But a new chief engineer was appointed, Othmar H. Ammann, who had just finished the George Washington Bridge. The whole project was checked again, and the original plans turned out to need some $48,500,000, more than the money available. So the engineers asked how much bridge New York actually needed. They estimated the traffic twenty-five years ahead, and they looked at what the roads leading to the bridge could carry. Neither called for two decks and sixteen lanes. Eight lanes on one deck would do it, and wider lanes than the old plan had given. Wider lanes meant clearing the middle of the bridge, so out came the two center cables and the two center legs of each tower. The hard part was that the towers were already being made. On February 15, 1934, the day the redesign began, 1,800 tons of tower steel had been delivered to the fabricating shops, 1,200 tons of it for the tower pedestals. Work on the inner pair of legs stopped. Work on the outer pair carried on. All but 650 tons of the steel already in the shops went into the new design. The anchorages were already begun too. Their concrete cores had been built for four cables. Holding two meant a new way of fixing the cables to the anchors, and that needed more concrete, not less. The architect brought in to shape them, Aymar Embury II, wrote that he knew so little about anchorages that "he was neither fettered by tradition nor hampered by knowledge." Dropping the center pair of cables alone was put at about $1,000,000 saved. The whole redesign saved about $10,000,000. And the towers did not fall behind. All 7,500 tons of steel for the towers and cable bents were made and put up within the contract time, as first scheduled. The bridge opened for traffic on July 11, 1936. At two o'clock that afternoon an Army camera plane flew over it and took this picture. The suspension bridge is the one in front, its deck still white and new. Look at either tower. It stands on two legs. Part of the first Triborough design was to be buried on Wards Island. The city had built seventeen footings there for the old viaduct before the money ran out in 1932. Engineering News-Record reported in August 1935 that the new design was able to use thirteen of them. "The other four will be left in place but will be graded over." This photograph comes from the National Archives, in the Army Air Forces records, series "Airscapes" of American and Foreign Areas, item 18-AA-91-57. The print is lettered with its own date and time, 7-11-36, 2:00P, so it was taken on the afternoon of July 11, 1936, the day the bridge opened. The mount says it was received from Mitchel Field, New York, that September. What the photo is not: the big steel arch behind the suspension bridge is a different bridge, the railroad's, and it plays no part in this story. The top of the print is hazy, and the warm brown of the old print has been turned to black and white. The photo was cropped to the print itself, taking off the mount, the typed label and the lettered date along the bottom edge, and trimmed on the right to fit the frame. Nothing else was changed. Where the numbers in the words on the photo come from: Four cables, 4, and two, 2: Engineering News-Record, August 8, 1935, says "four cables and two decks were contemplated" and that "the tower foundations and the anchorages were built for this four-cable layout." E. Warren Bowden, assistant to the chief engineer, wrote in Civil Engineering in August 1936 that "two of the four cables and the two central columns of the towers were thus eliminated." The four-legged towers and the inner legs: Bowden again. The redesign came "after the fabrication of the towers had been started on the basis of the original four-column design," and "work on the inside pair of columns was stopped but that on the outside columns was continued." More concrete for two cables: the architect, Aymar Embury II, in Civil Engineering, February 1938: "This anchorage was originally intended to hold four cables but was redesigned for only two cables, the new attachment of the cables to the anchors requiring additional concrete in the anchorage." The savings in the long caption, about $1,000,000 for the center cables and about $10,000,000 in all, are the 1935 estimates printed in Engineering News-Record, not a final account. Embury had a fine way with words about his own job. The big steel arms already sticking out of the anchorages, he wrote, were "a sort of glorified clothes-pole around which the cables were to be bent downward." Othmar H. Ammann was the Triborough Bridge Authority's chief engineer, and Allston Dana was the engineer of design who worked with Embury on the anchorages. But the bridge began with the city's own Department of Plant and Structures, which built the tower foundations and the anchorage cores from 1929 to 1932, and Engineering News-Record credits one of the first suggestions for a Triborough bridge to that department's chief engineer, back in 1916. |
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| Dave Frieder commented on the above post Yes, I know this. First design was by Aymar Embury II. He was Engineer of design. Not Architect. Engineer of design for present design was Allston Dana. One of MY views. |
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| Metrotrails added The Robert F Kennedy Bridge, or the Triborough Bridge, at the suspension section over the Hell Gate, from Wards Island, New York. The complex expressway viaduct has a series of spans connecting Manhattan, the Bronx, and Astoria Queens over Wards and Randall's Islands, which were previously two separate Islands connected by a landfill. The spans terminate in all three boroughs with connection on Randall's Island.It has been described as "not a bridge so much as a traffic machine, the largest ever built". In fact, the Manhattan connector incorporates the largest vertical lift bridge in the world. Ground was broken for the span in Astoria in 1929, but was badly delayed due to the Great Depression. The Y-shaped sky highway was opened July 11th, 1936, with President Roosevelt in attendance. M'ke Helbing shared |
Spiro Polychronopoulos posted two photos with the comment: "New York's RFK Bridge (Previously the Triborough Bridge) constructed by Othmar Ammann, is a vital link in NYC. Connecting Queens, The Bronx, And Manhattan via 3 bridges and viaducts....the Bridge I posted is the main suspension Bridge in this intricate system. You can catch great views of this Bridge from Astoria Park, on the Queens side."
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| 2 [As a comment pointed out, that is Hell Gate Bridge in the right background.] |
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| Timothy Fugmann posted TriBorough from Randall’s Island |
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| Metrotrails added Wards Island Pedestrian Bridge, originally known as Harlem River Pedestrian Bridge, completed in 1951. It connects the east River Greenway to Wards Island and Randall's Island Parks. The center section is a lift span that allows for the passage of larger ships. M'ke Helbing shared |
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| Metrotrails added The Robert F Kennedy Bridge, or the Triborough Bridge, at the lift section over the Harlem River, from the walkway on the Manhattan side, New York. The complex expressway viaduct has a series of spans connecting Manhattan, the Bronx, and Astoria Queens over Wards and Randall's Islands, which were previously two separate Islands connected by a landfill. The spans terminate in all three boroughs with connection on Randall's Island.It has been described as "not a bridge so much as a traffic machine, the largest ever built". In fact, the Manhattan connector incorporates the largest vertical lift bridge in the world. Ground was broken for the span in Astoria in 1929, but was badly delayed due to the Great Depression. The Y-shaped sky highway was opened July 11th, 1936, with President Roosevelt in attendance. M'ke Helbing shared |
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| Jeffrey Gluck posted Harlem River lift span of the Robert F. Kennedy (Triborough) Bridge (NY Route 900G) |
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| Michael Quartararo posted Triborough Bridge extension to Manhattan Bob Flisser: Officially renamed the RFK bridge, but nobody calls it that. Like nobody calls the replacement for the Tappan Zee the Cuomo bridge. Names seem to stick. |
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| Bridges Now and Then posted Triborough Bridge construction, Randall’s Island, New York, February 10, 1936. (Triborough Bridge & Tunnel Authority Archive) |
This is the first time I have seen a traffic jam on a pedestrian path.
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| nycbridges |
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| MTA Flickr, License: Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) Triborough Bridge circa 1937 Aerial photograph showing the original traffic junction of the Triborough Bridge, now the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge. Circa 1937. Courtesy of MTA Bridges and Tunnels Special Archives |
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| Bridges Now and Then posted "The Triborough Bridge consists of a bridge between Wards Island and Astoria, Queens, over Hells Gate; a bridge between Manhattan and Randalls Island, over the Harlem River; a bridge between Randalls Island and the Bronx, over the Bronx Kill; and a fourth elevated bridge towards Randalls and Wards Islands." Seen here during construction, 1930s. (NY Daily News) |
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| MTA Flickr, License: Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) Triborough Bridge Under Construction Circa 1934 The Queens tower of the Triborough Bridge suspension span is shown under construction, as a crane lifts a portion of the tower in place. The Wards Island tower is visible in the background. October 1, 1934. Courtesy of MTA Bridges and Tunnels Special Archives Bridges Now and Then posted "Queens Tower of the Triborough Bridge Under Construction Circa 1934, Wards Island tower is visible in the background." (Courtesy of MTA Bridges and Tunnels Special Archives) Dave Frieder: Engineer of design, Allston Dana. This is the 2nd design for the Triborough. Part of Middle strut being installed. The Vertical Posts between the Top and Middle struts serve no purpose. Only Decorative. Dennis DeBruler: https://www.flickr.com/.../in/album-72177720307243678/, License: Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) Bridges Now and Then: Dennis DeBruler Why post the same pic? Dennis DeBruler: It is the same photo, but it provides additional information. The link allows a reader to browse the related photos at that source and gives access to the licensing information. We will continue to disagree that a link to the source of a photo should be included in the description. "appropriate credit — If supplied, you must provide the name of the creator and attribution parties, a copyright notice, a license notice, a disclaimer notice, and a link to the material. CC licenses prior to Version 4.0 also require you to provide the title of the material if supplied, and may have other slight differences." via https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ Bridges Now and Then: Dennis DeBruler K |
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| Bridges Now and Then posted Construction of the Triborough Bridge, New York, 1936. The Hell Gate Bridge is seen behind. (MOMA) [PRJ answered a question that I have now deleted because I now know that MOMA stands for the Museum of Modern Art in NYC.] Dave Frieder: One of the few Bridges where the top of the road deck is in the center of the stiffening truss. Engineer of design, Allston Dana. |
I normally don't bother with deck street views, but because of Dave's comment above about this bridge using a pony truss, I checked it out.
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Two of several photos from a history of the Triborough Bridge:
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| 1 The Triborough Bridge suspension span between Queens and Ward's Island, as shown under construction in 1934. (Photo by New York State Department of Parks and Historic Preservation.) |
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| Bridges Now and Then posted Riveters on the Triborough Bridge, c.1930s. (New York Daily News) James Shinn: That's a "Hell Dog" that hand is holding, used to drive and shape hot rivets. Came in different poundages based on what ya were driving. One could change tools from a driving shaping tool to a chisel bit, cold cut a rivet head or bolt head off, change back to a punch bit and drive it out of the hole. One could easily blow his brains out changing bits with AP on, or shoot the Plunger Slug out into no where. The rule ... he who blows the slug out, and lives, goes to the ground to find it. Mark Hechinger: Luv the lack of Safety Glasses and Hearing protection. These men were hard core tough as the steel they worked! Aaron Sorocki: Mark Hechinger they also lived out there last years in pain and died prematurely, Eric Baumgartner: Mark Hechinger heck, not even a filter on the cigarette... lol Jon Wolfe shared |
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| Bridges Now and Then posted Cable work on New York's Triborough Bridge suspension span, 1936. (MTA Bridges and Tunnels) |
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| Dave Frieder commented on the above post |
Christopher R Hernandez posted nine photos with the comment: "Triborough Bridge (officially Robert F Kennedy Bridge) is a bridge in 3 sections connecting the NYC boroughs of Queens, Manhattan and the Bronx. The longest section is the East River Span going from Queens to Wards/Randall's Island. Opened in 1936."
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The bridge was originally designed for two decks and four main cables, similar to the Manhattan Bridge. It was begun by the city on the eve of the Depression, and then taken over by the newly-formed Triborough Bridge Authority for completion after a re-design. If you look at the tower foundations, you can see where the middle pair of legs was to go. Torched-off eyebars also still exist inside the anchorages. This double-deck plan also likely influenced the retention of the truss design.
ReplyDeleteAlso, MOMA is Museum of Modern Art in NYC. That photo was on the cover of a book/exhibit catalog called "The Architecture of Bridges", published in the late 1940's.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the information. I have updated the text to include both comments.
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