Richmond-San Rafael Bridge
From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.
The Richmond-San Rafael Bridge is the northernmost of the east-west crossings of the San Francisco Bay, connecting Richmond on the east to San Rafael on the west end. It is 5.5 miles long and opened in 1956. It is officially named the John F. McCarthy Memorial Bridge.
The bridge is part of Interstate 580 and was the last Bay Area bridge to replace a previous ferry service.
The bridge spans two principal ship channels and has two separate major spans, each of the cantilever type. In the interest of resistance to earthquakes, the portion connecting the major spans is lowered in elevation, giving the bridge a "roller coaster" appearance and so also the popular name of its style; the "roller coaster span".
The bridge is currently undergoing extensive seismic retrofit, although of far lesser extent that some other bridges in the area (like those other retrofits, the project is grossly over its projected cost and budget). The bridge is also showing its age, as there have recently been several instances of cars being damaged while traveling on the lower deck by fist-sized concrete chunks falling from the joints of upper deck panels.
External links
- California Dept. of Transportation: Richmond-San Rafael Bridge History & Information (http://www.dot.ca.gov/hq/traffops/hwybrdg/tollbridge/History/richmond.html)
- Univ. of California, Berkeley: Bridging the Bay: Richmond-San Rafael Bridge (http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/news_events/exhibits/bridge/rsr.html)
- Maps and aerial photos (http://kvaleberg.com/extensions/mapsources/index.php?params=37.9347_N_-122.4338_E_type:city_region:US)
- Street map from MapQuest (http://mapquest.com/maps/map.adp?latlongtype=decimal&latitude=37.9347&longitude=-122.4338&zoom=6) or Google Maps (http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=37.9347,-122.4338&spn=0.11,0.18)
- Topographic map from TopoZone (http://topozone.com/map.asp?lat=37.9347&lon=-122.4338&s=200&size=m&layer=DRG100&datum=nad83)
- Aerial image or topographic map from TerraServer-USA (http://terraserver-usa.com/image.aspx?s=14&lon=-122.4338&lat=37.9347&w=2)
- Satellite image from Google Maps (http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=37.9347,-122.4338&spn=0.11,0.18&t=k)
