A look back and forward at Steel Bridge construction

How many do you konw about stell bridge?Let's talk about it.Look back and forward at steel bridge construction.

The original Steel Bridge opened in 1901.

For 60 years, three toots from a passing boat alerted the bridge tender to open the structure.

Using a big “watch key” crank, the tender could be seen huffing and puffing as he walked in a circle. It took 27 turns in low gear, or seven in high gear, to open the draw. But that wasn’t the toughest chore for bridge tenders. Theodore Brickhouse told The Pilot in 1961 that on winter nights, tenders hung 16 kerosene lanterns to mark the bridge.

A ship slammed into an approach in the 1930s, cutting it in half. The bridge was closed for weeks while workers rebuilt it. In 1960, Hurricane Donna sent a half-sunken barge into the bridge’s underpinnings, causing about $4,000 worth of damage.

Further complicating matters, heavily loaded trucks were not heeding the warning signs and were crossing the narrow steel structure. C.C. Battige, assistant bridge engineer for the Highway Department, told The Pilot he was worried one of those trucks might crash through the old bridge decking.

Those worries were allayed when in February 1961, the drawbridge was closed. The horse-and-buggy holdover, one of the last hand-operated structures in Virginia, was to be demolished and replaced by an electric-powered, push-button-operated bascule-type bridge.

The new Steel Bridge opened in April 1962.

And more than 50 years later, crews are hard at work to replace it yet again.

Though it’s far less work to open, those openings still prompt huffing and puffing – this time from motorists stuck in traffic.

Dominion Boulevard is one of the region’s most notorious bottlenecks because four lanes of traffic merge into two to cross the bridge. About 32,500 vehicles travel across it daily, the city said.

There are openings on the hour seven days a week from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. and on demand from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., with restrictions for morning and evening rush-hour traffic.

As the city’s population boomed in the 1990s, widening Dominion Boulevard became a priority.

“By 2040, the demographers are predicting that over 318,000 people will call Chesapeake home,” Mayor Alan Krasnoff said during a groundbreaking ceremony last December. “Fifty years ago, I doubt anyone could imagine that kind of transformational growth, but grow we have … and grow we will.”

The 3.8-mile project is designed to ease traffic by widening to four lanes the Steel Bridge and Dominion Boulevard, between Cedar Road and Great Bridge Boulevard. The drawbridge will be replaced with a tolled, fixed span.

While improving traffic on land, it also will free boaters from the headache of one more stop on the Intracoastal Waterway.

On its website, the city of Chesapeake also said the fixed span is more economical because there is less upkeep and operational cost than with a movable bridge. It also was designed to accommodate anticipated traffic in 2034.

The $345 million project should be completed in 2017.

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