Bay Bridge Crack Repaired in a Weekend

• bridges
• infrastructure
• construction
• engineering
• transportation
• Rebuilding America
• San Francisco Chronicle
• California

The Bay Bridge reopened at 6:30 a.m. today after crews working around the clock repaired a crack in a steel link on the eastern span, bringing relief to thousands of people who had assumed they would have to find other ways to get across the bay.

Cars led by a phalanx of California Highway Patrol officers began crossing less than two hours after the reopening time that Caltrans originally set when it closed the bridge Thursday evening to remove a section of the eastern span and install a temporary detour. Traffic resumed well ahead of the 5 a.m. Wednesday reopening that Caltrans scheduled Monday, after the crack in the steel link, called an eyebar, had been discovered over the weekend.

"Through the night, the crews have worked nonstop - for almost 70 hours - and were able to complete repair work on the damaged eyebar beam," Caltrans Director Randy Iwasaki said at a hastily called news conference on Yerba Buena Island at 6:10 a.m. "The bridge has been inspected, and it's safer than it was when we closed it."

The reopening took much of the load away from other bridges, BART and ferries, which otherwise would have been used by hundreds of thousands of extra people today to get across the bay.

Kat Woods of Oakland usually takes the 7:05 a.m. ferry from Oakland's Jack London Square for her job in San Francisco, but she avoided that boat fearing there would be large crowds. "I thought, 'OK, I'll just catch the later one. I'll bring a book, and I'll just wait in line," Woods said.

But there was no line, so Woods ended up taking a high-speed catamaran that was added to the morning's departures. It left at 7:35 a.m. with only seven other people on board.

BART, which had near-record ridership Friday, was expecting another bump in passengers today. Some people who had made their plans decided not to change at the last minute.

"Yesterday, they said it would be closed until Wednesday, and I said, 'OK, that's it,' " said Joshua Theaker, 56, of Emeryville, who was in midst of a two-hour commute to NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View. Usually he drives, but his wife took the car today.

"Hey, this is the Bay Area," Theaker said as he waited for a train at the MacArthur BART station in Oakland. "People do what they have to do. I was upset to hear about the crack, but I'm glad they fixed it."

With the Bay Bridge open and some people sticking by their original alternative plans, freeways were moving smoothly. Traffic at the bridge's toll plaza was light.

"It's good," CHP Officer Kevin Kroncke as he manned a post at Caltrans' Traffic Management Center in Oakland.

The 73-year-old Bay Bridge, crossed by more than 260,000 cars and trucks a day, was shut down at 8 p.m. Thursday to replace a section of the eastern span, part of the construction of the new eastern half of the bridge.

But on Saturday, inspectors found a crack in an eyebar that helps hold up the eastern span. The crack was unrelated to the project that shut down the bridge over the weekend, Caltrans said.

Caltrans said the cracked eyebar by itself would have forced officials to close the bridge for repairs.

Dan Himick, president of C.C. Myers, the contractor on the complex seismic project, said, "Last night was one of those nights where everything went perfect, and the crews got it done really, really fast. It's amazing how fast they got it done. Everything fit perfect, the fix is in place."

Iwasaki said some detours would remain in place. Northbound Interstate 880 to westbound Highway 92 remains closed, and southbound I-880 to westbound 92 will remain a two-lane configuration. The westbound 92 Hesperian Boulevard off-ramp will stay closed.

Comment Title
Your Name
Email Address
Website	make public
Comment
Please enter the characters shown below:
	Make sure your comment is relevant to the topic discussed. Comments not relevant to the topic will be deleted. Neither you nor Popular Mechanics has the ability to make your e-mail address public. However, we ask that you submit your e-mail address to us just in case we need to contact you. Thank you for your understanding--The Editors.