The City Island Bridge is a

bridge A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually someth ...

in the

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

borough A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History In the Middle Ag ...

the Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New ...

, connecting City Island with

Rodman's Neck Rodman's Neck (formerly Ann Hook's Neck) refers to a peninsula of land in the New York City borough of the Bronx that juts out into Long Island Sound. The southern third of the peninsula is used as a firing range by the New York City Police Depar ...

on the

mainland Mainland is defined as "relating to or forming the main part of a country or continent, not including the islands around it egardless of status under territorial jurisdiction by an entity" The term is often politically, economically and/or dem ...

. The original bridge, which carried vehicles from 1901 to 2015, was replaced by the current bridge (also called the City Island Causeway), which opened in 2017. A temporary bridge was used for the demolition and construction period between the original and new bridges.

Old bridge

Since the

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...

, there have been plans to link City Island with the mainland via means of a bridge. Before the original bridge named "City Island Bridge" was opened, there was another, unnamed bridge connecting City Island with the rest of the Bronx. The opening date of this first bridge is unclear; some sources attest that it opened in 1873, while one letter states that it opened in 1857—a disputed date since the letter's writer may have been referring to a past date. This first bridge, which was definitely under planning in the 1860s, was listed in an 1872 map. It was a tolled

drawbridge A drawbridge or draw-bridge is a type of moveable bridge typically at the entrance to a castle or tower surrounded by a moat. In some forms of English, including American English, the word ''drawbridge'' commonly refers to all types of movea ...

that was built partly out of wood from the USS ''North Carolina''. This bridge was located north of the 1899 bridge and connected to City Island at Bridge Street. When the

New York City Department of Parks and Recreation The New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, also called the Parks Department or NYC Parks, is the department of the government of New York City responsible for maintaining the city's parks system, preserving and maintaining the ecolo ...

took over

Pelham Bay Park Pelham Bay Park is a municipal park located in the northeast corner of the New York City borough of the Bronx. It is, at , the largest public park in New York City. The park is more than three times the size of Manhattan's Central Park. The pa ...

in 1888, it claimed responsibility for maintenance over the western end of the bridge, which was located in the park. The second City Island Bridge, which was actually the first with that particular name, began construction in 1898 and was completed in 1901. The $200,000 bridge was of

stone In geology, rock (or stone) is any naturally occurring solid mass or aggregate of minerals or mineraloid matter. It is categorized by the minerals included, its Chemical compound, chemical composition, and the way in which it is formed. Rocks ...

and

steel Steel is an alloy made up of iron with added carbon to improve its strength and fracture resistance compared to other forms of iron. Many other elements may be present or added. Stainless steels that are corrosion- and oxidation-resistan ...

construction, and spanned . It consisted of five fixed spans and a central

swing Swing or swinging may refer to: Apparatus * Swing (seat), a hanging seat that swings back and forth * Pendulum, an object that swings * Russian swing, a swing-like circus apparatus * Sex swing, a type of harness for sexual intercourse * Swing ri ...

section. As originally built, the bridge's City Island end connected to City Island Avenue rather than at Bridge Street, and was located partially on landfill. The bridge was the sole entry and exit for vehicles on City Island. As such, it served both as a landmark and a gateway to City Island. The swing section was deactivated and turned into a fixed span in 1963. In 1978–1979, a proposed renovation would have detonated explosives on the corroding piers, but the plan was altered so that the piers would get heavy refurbishment instead. By 2002, the bridge was in bad shape, and city leaders held a meeting about the deteriorating bridge, showing images of corrosion on the supports, although the corrosion had since been fixed by that time. The bridge, which had been inspected in July 1999, had been deemed capable of carrying up to . The city leaders listed four options for the bridge's future: one entailed renovating the existing span, while the other three were for new spans. The new span proposals included a conventional

causeway A causeway is a track, road or railway on the upper point of an embankment across "a low, or wet place, or piece of water". It can be constructed of earth, masonry, wood, or concrete. One of the earliest known wooden causeways is the Sweet Tr ...

-style bridge with four piers; an

arch bridge An arch bridge is a bridge with abutments at each end shaped as a curved arch. Arch bridges work by transferring the weight of the bridge and its loads partially into a horizontal thrust restrained by the abutments at either side. A viaduct ...

with large foundations on either side of the water; and a

cable-stayed bridge A cable-stayed bridge has one or more ''towers'' (or ''pylons''), from which cables support the bridge deck. A distinctive feature are the cables or stays, which run directly from the tower to the deck, normally forming a fan-like pattern ...

with a tower either high.

Replacement

City Island Bridge - from sidewalk, 2011

To replace the deteriorating bridge, the city originally intended to build a cable-stayed bridge, with a high tower, wide at the top, with a base of . Vertical clearance above high water would be . The new bridge would be located in the same footprint as the existing bridge, although it would be wider to accommodate three standard-width traffic lanes, a bicycle lane and a pedestrian walkway. The original schedule was for the project to begin in 2007 with completion in 2010. The project was then postponed until June 2012.New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT)(2011)
"2010 Bridges and Tunnels Annual Condition Report."
Accessed January 30, 2012. Due to the project postponement, during 2010 repairs were made to the existing bridge deck, piers, and west abutment. Due to a lack of funding the project was delayed once more until the city announced it would accept bids in late 2012, with Tutor Perini selected as general contractor in February 2013. In 2005 the estimated cost of the project was $50 million.H. Perahia, L. King, K. Batra, S. Jarosz (2005)
"City Island Cable-Stayed Bridge in New York City."
Presented at the 3rd New York City Bridge Conference, New York, September 12–13, 2005. In 2009 the estimate increased to $120 million due to redesigns and the addition of related projects. The final bid came in at $102.7 million. Some residents, however, opposed the design of the cable-stayed bridge and felt that its tower would be out of character with the

low-rise A low-rise is a building that is only a few stories tall or any building that is shorter than a high-rise, though others include the classification of mid-rise. Definition Emporis defines a low-rise as "an enclosed structure below 35 metres 15 ...

homes on City Island. Opponents of the bridge design filed a lawsuit against the city on November 6, 2013. A Bronx

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

judge granted a temporary injunction on that date. In December 2013 the court lifted the injunction, but ruled that the city must conduct public hearings. The city's prior consultations with the island community, which began during the early design stages, had been informal. The court's ruling requires the city to follow its

Uniform Land Use Review Procedure Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) is a process mandated by the 1975 revision of the New York City Charter that is invoked when a proposed development will affect certain legal protections afforded to the existing area and/or its inhabitan ...

, which includes local Community Board hearings. On May 5, 2014, the original bridge plans were scrapped, and the de Blasio administration chose to go with a slightly cheaper and much shorter

-style bridge. The bridge, which was later approved, would be completed by 2017. A temporary steel bridge was erected in 2015, but a partial collapse in September delayed the opening of the temporary bridge. On December 16, 2015, the

New York City Department of Transportation The New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) is the agency of the government of New York City responsible for the management of much of New York City's transportation infrastructure. Ydanis Rodriguez is the Commissioner of the Depart ...

(NYCDOT) conducted a road test on the temporary steel bridge by running heavy equipment including fire trucks over the bridge. The NYCDOT conducted the tests to ease residents' concerns about the integrity of the temporary structure. Two days later on December 18, the original bridge was closed, and traffic was routed to the temporary bridge. Shortly after that, the city began demolishing the original bridge, with the new bridge being constructed on the same site as the 1901 bridge. The new bridge opened on October 29, 2017.

References

External links

Bridge and Tunnel Club website (photos)City Island Bridge history at bridgesnyc.com
{{NYC_Bridge Bridges completed in 1901 Bridges in the Bronx Swing bridges in the United States Bike paths in New York City Road bridges in New York City City Island, Bronx Pedestrian bridges in New York City Steel bridges in the United States Pelham Bay Park