Queensway Twin Bridges

The Queensway Twin Bridges (sometimes Queens Way Bridges or Queensway Bay Bridge) connect downtown Long Beach with the outer Port of Long Beach. They are the southernmost crossing of the Los Angeles River, near the mouth of the river, where it empties into Queensway Bay, and they are the primary arterial link between Long Beach and RMS Queen Mary. The bridges were completed in June 1970 and opened on October 5, 1970.

History

During the planning and construction phase, the bridge was known as the Magnolia Avenue Bridge or Magnolia Bridge. The consulting engineering firm headed by Martin A. Nishkian was retained to design the bridge.

The Bridges were built relatively quickly. The superstructure was prefabricated offsite, shipped and partially assembled before being erected in 14 pieces over only 11 days. Murphy Pacific fabricated the complete superstructure in their Richmond, California yard and shipped it to Long Beach in 30 sections via barge. Six segments were erected on the harbor side in late January 1970; the six mirror-image segments were erected on the Long Beach side in early May 1970; finally, the largest and heaviest 290-foot (88 m) long drop-in sections of the main spans were erected on 26 May 1970.

By 1972, the Bridges had taken on their present name.

In April 2010, seismic retrofits were started on ramps leading to the Bridges. The contractor abruptly abandoned work in November 2010, with the contractor stating they had not been paid and the County of Los Angeles finding fault in the contractor's work to-date.

Design

Each bridge carries an orthotropic deck atop steel box girders. Each bridge spans a total of 1,200 ft (370 m), excluding approaches, as a three-span girder bridge, with a 500 ft (150 m) main span flanked on each side by a 350 ft (110 m) side span. Including the 1,900 ft (580 m) south and 2,300 ft (700 m) north approaches, the total length of each bridge is 5,400 ft (1,600 m). The deck is coated with an epoxy asphalt wearing surface.

The main span includes a central 290 ft (88 m), 617-short-ton (560 t) drop-in section which was lifted in place by the Marine Boss floating crane. The drop-in span is supported on each side by a 105 ft (32 m) section cantilevered off the pier. The Bridges feature a 45 ft (14 m) vertical clearance above the average low tide mark and provide three lanes of traffic in each direction with a 6 ft (1.8 m) wide sidewalk outboard of the traffic lanes. The cost of the bridge was estimated at US$7,391,632 (equivalent to $56,680,000 in 2019), with the approach structures costing an additional US$5,882,761 (equivalent to $45,110,000 in 2019).

The Bridges subsequently won an AISC Prize Bridge Award in 1971.

In popular culture

The cost of closing the Queensway Bridges is only US $2,500 per day, facilitating filming on weekdays when many other Los Angeles-area locations are difficult to close. The Queensway Twin Bridges have served as the filming locations for numerous television shows and movies.

Text imported from Wikipedia article "Queensway Twin Bridges" and modified on March 30, 2021 according to the CC-BY-SA 4.0 International license.