Carquinez Bridge is Falling Down!

Once noted Carquinez span now being torn apartBy Mike AdamickCONTRA COSTA TIMES

A tangle of rusted metal, twisted steel and broken concrete crosses the Carquinez straits like a crazed, tetanus-laced house of horrors. Holes gape where cars once traveled securely. Workers prepare to lift out entire 500-foot sections of towering metal. It's a somber ending for a once remarkable bridge.

The Carquinez Bridge was once the largest span west of the Mississippi. Built for $8 million in 1927 -- $83 million in today's dollars -- it incorporated seismic safety engineering and three kinds of steel. As a new connection between Solano and Contra Costa counties, it touched off a bridge-building boom throughout the rest of the Bay Area, replaced a ferry system that once carried 400,000 people a year and opened a motoring gateway to the Central Valley. The Golden Gate and Bay bridges didn't follow until the next decade. Now, it's quickly becoming a shadow of its former self, picked apart and scavenged as crews begin a painstaking demolition expected to last through next year.

"We can't just blow it up," said Caltrans spokesman Bob Haus. "We basically have to reverse engineer it, and take it down like it was put up -- piece by piece." The bridge is coated with lead paint and corroded with rust in some parts -- not particularly healthy food for protected smelt and salmon that swim below in the straits. So crews have begun taking the bridge down in sections and likely won't finish until September 2007, according to the latest schedule.
It begins with the road decks. Basketball court-sized chunks of concrete and metal are laced with cables and slowly lowered onto barges. The process takes more than six hours per piece.
Once the road decks are gone, crews will turn their attention to the steel towers that support the cantilever span, Haus said. When the bridge was built, the sections were hoisted into place by large cranes. Haus said the exact same thing will happen beginning this month. Only instead of lifting the pieces into place, the cranes will lower the towers onto barges, he said.
Under terms of the $35 million demolition agreement, the contractor -- California Engineering Contractors -- will be able to cart the metal to a scrap yard and keep any profits from selling or recycling the steel.

That's not to say the bridge will disappear altogether. Crockett's historical society will receive pieces, while Caltrans will keep portions for its own museum. Haus said a segment may even be displayed near the pathway of the new suspension span, which replaced the 1927 span.
"This was the first of the Bay Area bridges," Haus said. It deserves some recognition, he said.
So why not just keep it up -- for BART or extra traffic? Haus said the bridge has reached the end of its useful life and can't be easily retrofitted. Plus, Caltrans doesn't want to pay the maintenance costs of keeping it in operation.

So after almost 80 years, the bridge will enjoy one last party -- a retirement ceremony slated for March 17 when Caltrans hopes to send the bridge out with a bang . . . just not a big one.

Opening: The Carquinez Bridge opened on May 21, 1927 -- one day after aviator Charles Lindbergh's famous solo flight across the Atlantic.

Operator: 1927-1940 private; 1940-today Caltrans
Length: .8 miles
Cost: $8 million ($83 million today)
Demolition cost: $35 million
Completion date: September 2007