Brooklyn Bridge

The Brooklyn Bridge (originally the New York and Brooklyn Bridge), one of the oldest suspension bridges in the United States, stretches 5,989 feet (1825 m) over the East River connecting the New York City boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn. On completion, it was the largest suspension bridge in the world and the first steel-wire suspension bridge.

History

Construction began in January 3, 1870. The Brooklyn Bridge was completed thirteen years later and was opened for use on May 24, 1883. On that first day, a total of 1,800 vehicles and 150,300 people crossed. The bridge's main span over the East River is 1,595 feet (486 meters). The bridge cost $15.1 million to build and approximately 27 people died during its construction. A week after the opening, on May 30, a rumor that the Bridge was going to collapse caused a stampede which crushed twelve people.

At the time it opened, it was the longest suspension bridge in the world — fifty percent longer than any previously built — and it has become a treasured landmark. Additionally, for several years the towers were the tallest structures in the Western Hemisphere. Since the 1980s, it has been floodlit at night to highlight its architectural features. The bridge is built from limestone, granite, and Rosendale natural cement. The architecture style is Gothic, with characteristic pointed arches above the passageways through the stone towers.

The bridge was designed by an engineering firm owned by John Augustus Roebling in Trenton, New Jersey. Roebling and his firm had built smaller suspension bridges, such as the John A. Roebling Suspension Bridge in Cincinnati, Ohio and the Waco Suspension Bridge in Waco, Texas, that served as the engineering prototypes for the final design.

As construction was beginning, Roebling's foot was seriously injured in a ferry when it crashed into a wharf; within a few weeks, he died of tetanus caused by the amputation of his toes. His son, Washington, succeeded him, but was stricken with caisson disease (decompression sickness), due to working in compressed air in caissons, in 1872. Washington's wife, Emily Warren Roebling, became his aide, learning engineering and communicating his wishes to the on-site assistants. When the bridge opened, she was the first person to cross it. Washington Roebling rarely visited the site again, actually residing in Trenton, New Jersey, and elsewhere during most of its construction; a famous engraving of him most likely started the rumor of his "watching the construction from afar." At the time the bridge was built, the aerodynamics of bridge building had not been worked out. Bridges were not tested in wind tunnels until the 1950s - well after the collapse of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge in the 1940s. It is therefore fortunate that the open truss structure supporting the deck is by its nature less subject to aerodynamic problems. Roebling designed a bridge and truss system that was six times as strong as he thought it needed to be. Because of this, the Brooklyn Bridge is still standing when many of the bridges built around the same time have vanished into history and have been replaced. This is also in spite of the nefarious substitution of inferior quality wire in the cabling supplied by the contractor J. Lloyd Haigh - by the time it was discovered, it was too late to replace the cabling that had already been constructed. Roebling determined that the poorer wire would leave the bridge four rather than six times as strong as necessary, so it was eventually allowed to stand, with the addition of 250 cables. Brooklyn Bridge - Currier & Ives 1877.jpg Brooklyn-bridge-1890.png BrooklynBridgeSchematic.jpg

At various times, the bridge has carried horses and trolley traffic; at present, it has six lanes for motor vehicles, with a separate walkway along the centerline for pedestrians and bicycles. The two inside traffic lanes once carried elevated trains of the from Brooklyn points to a terminal at Park Row. Streetcars ran on what are now the two center lanes (shared with other traffic) until the elevated lines stopped using the bridge in 1944, when they moved to the protected center tracks. In 1950, the streetcars also stopped running, and the bridge was rebuilt to carry six lanes of automobile traffic.

The bridge tracks were planned to connect to what is now the Nassau Street Line subway at Chambers Street to form part of the never-finished Centre Street Loop.

The bridge was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on June 17, 1977 and on March 24, 1983 the bridge was designated a National Historic Engineering Landmark.

The construction of the Brooklyn Bridge is detailed in the 1971 book The Great Bridge by David McCullough and in the first PBS documentary film ever made by Ken Burns, Brooklyn Bridge (1980). Burns drew heavily on McCullough's book for the film and used him as narrator.

The bridge now imposes a weight limit of 3 short tons (2.7 tonnes) with no trucks or buses allowed.

1994 Terrorist Attack

On March 1, 1994, Lebanese-born Rashid Baz opened fire on a van carrying members of the Chabad-Lubavitch Orthodox Jewish sect, striking 16-year old student Ari Halberstam and three others traveling on the bridge. Halberstam died 5 days later from his wounds. Baz was apparently acting out of revenge for the Hebron massacre of 29 Muslims by Baruch Goldstein that had taken place days earlier on February 25, 1994. Baz was convicted of murder and sentenced to a 141-year prison term. After initially classifying the murder as one committed out of road rage, the FBI reclassified the case in 2000 as a terrorist attack. The entrance ramp to the bridge on the Manhattan side was named the Ari Halberstam Memorial Ramp in memory of the victimAri Halberstam Memorial Ramp.

2003 Plot

In 2003, truck driver Iyman Faris was sentenced to 20 years in prison for providing material support to al-Qaeda, after an earlier plot to destroy the bridge by cutting through its support wires with blowtorches was cancelled.

A bridge for pedestrians in an age of automobiles

While the bridge has always permitted the passage of pedestrians across its span, its role in allowing thousands to cross takes on a special importance in times of crisis and becomes a symbol of New Yorkers' resilience.

During transit strikes by the Transport Workers Union in 1980 and 2005 the bridge was used by people commuting to work, with Mayors Koch and Bloomberg crossing the bridge to show solidarity with the inconvenienced public. Following the 1965, 1977 and 2003 Blackouts and most famously after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center, the bridge was used by people in Manhattan to escape after subway service was suspended.

2006 Cold War Cache Discovery

On Tuesday, March 21, 2006, a cache was found in the Brooklyn Bridge by New York City Department of Transportation employees, who were conducting maintenance on the structure. The cache contained food, medical supplies, and was apparently a bunker from the Cold War era. Its purpose is currently unknown, but it is believed to have been used for holding supplies in the event of a nuclear attack on New York City. Spokeswoman Kay Sarlin said one of the containers was marked, "To be opened after attack by the enemy." The stockpile included empty water drums and boxes of medical supplies, such as tourniquet bandages and an intravenous drip. Also, there were cans of high-calorie crackers with instructions to consume 10,000 calories a day per person. The instructions said the crackers should be destroyed after 10 years, but they were mostly intact. Sarlin said the space historically has been used for storage, but the department did not have any indication that the cache was stored there. "It's hard to believe that the space was meant to be a fallout shelter, because it is not underground and light and air does get inside it," she said. "Could it have been a bunker for the mayor? We don't know." The Department of Transportation plans to donate the drums and cans to a civil defense museum, while it will turn over the medical supplies to the city's Department of Health for disposal. Cold War Cache

Cultural significance

Contemporaries marveled at what technology was capable of and the bridge became a symbol of the optimism of the time. John Perry Barlow wrote in the late 20th century of the "literal and genuinely religious leap of faith" embodied in the Brooklyn Bridge … the Brooklyn Bridge required of its builders faith in their ability to control technology." Cultural Significance

References to "selling the Brooklyn Bridge" abound in American culture, sometimes as examples of rural gullibility but more often in connection with an idea that strains credulity. For example, "If you believe that, I have a wonderful bargain for you…" References are often nowadays more oblique, such as "I could sell you some lovely riverside property in Brooklyn ... "

In his second book The Bridge, Hart Crane begins with a poem entitled "Poem: To Brooklyn Bridge." The bridge was a source of inspiration for Crane and he owned different apartments specifically to have different views of the bridge.

Film

In the 1998 American version of Godzilla, the bridge is attacked by Zilla, otherwise called the American Godzilla, destroying the towers and train tracks.
In the 1998 film Deep Impact, a tsunami caused by a comet crashing into the Atlantic Ocean destroyed the bridge.
The Brooklyn Bridge is featured at the end of Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York.
Featured in the 2004 film World Police.
The bridge played an important part in a scene in Fantastic 4 (2005 film)''.
The DVD cover for the film The Siege shows an image of the Brooklyn Bridge being destroyed in a terrorist attack. In the film this attack is not shown, although the bridge is used as an escape from Manhattan during terrorist attacks.
The movie Virginal Young Blondes (2004) also takes place on the Brooklyn Bridge, when the two main characters get stoned together in the movie's last scene.

Television

A TV show called Brooklyn Bridge aired in prime time from 1991 through 1993 on CBS.
The Brooklyn Bridge is featured in Disney's Oliver & Company as the bridge itself but with the automobile lanes covered.
A dramatization of the challenges faced by the Roebling family during construction of the bridge are portrayed in the BBC documentary series Seven Wonders of the Industrial World.
On The Fairly Oddparents, a short scene of the world laughing at the end of the episode "Information Stupor Highway" shows New York City laughing with an animated Brooklyn Bridge.
The span is seen in several episodes of The Cosby Show.
In 2006's Superman Returns, the bridge is seen in several scenes. In addition, Superman and Lois Lane fly parallel to the bridge.

Other Media

The bridge is part of the cover of the book Twin Towers.
The bridge is featured in SimCity 3000, and in SimCity 4: Rush Hour as the "Medium Suspension" bridge type for avenues and highways.
The bridge was blown up by Magneto and the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants during a recent issue of Ultimate X-Men.
The Money Song from Monty Python's Flying Circus features the line And my dollar bills could buy the Brooklyn Bridge.

History

1994 Terrorist Attack

2003 Plot

A bridge for pedestrians in an age of automobiles

2006 Cold War Cache Discovery

Cultural significance

Film

Television

Other Media

References

External links

Further reading

Gourt Home::Gourt :: Brooklyn Bridge

History

1994 Terrorist Attack

2003 Plot

A bridge for pedestrians in an age of automobiles

2006 Cold War Cache Discovery

Cultural significance

Film

Television

Other Media

References

External links

Further reading