The Delaware River–Turnpike Toll Bridge is a four-lane, steel

through arch bridge A through arch bridge, also known as a through-type arch bridge, is a bridge that is made from materials such as steel or reinforced concrete, in which the base of an arch structure is below the deck but the top rises above it. It can either be lo ...

crossing the Delaware River between Burlington Township, Burlington County,

New Jersey New Jersey is a U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic States, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States, Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York (state), New York; on the ea ...

and Bristol Township,

Bucks County Bucks County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 646,538, making it the fourth-most populous county in Pennsylvania. Its county seat is Doylestown. The county is named after the English ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Ma ...

. As a part of

Interstate 95 Interstate 95 (I-95) is the main north–south Interstate Highway on the East Coast of the United States, running from US Route 1 (US 1) in Miami, Florida, to the Houlton–Woodstock Border Crossing between Maine and the Canadi ...

, it is a major highway link between

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

and

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

. The bridge also connects the

Pennsylvania Turnpike The Pennsylvania Turnpike (Penna Turnpike or PA Turnpike) is a toll highway operated by the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. A controlled-access highway, it runs for across the state. The turnpike's ...

's east-west mainline with the main trunk of the

New Jersey Turnpike The New Jersey Turnpike (NJTP) is a system of controlled-access highways in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The turnpike is maintained by the New Jersey Turnpike Authority (NJTA).The Garden State Parkway, although maintained by NJTA, is not co ...

, via the

Pearl Harbor Memorial Turnpike Extension The New Jersey Turnpike (NJTP) is a system of controlled-access highways in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The turnpike is maintained by the New Jersey Turnpike Authority (NJTA).The Garden State Parkway, although maintained by NJTA, is not cons ...

(formerly known as the Pennsylvania Extension). Tolls are collected only in the west/southbound direction via electronic toll collection.

History

The bridge was built by both the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) and the New Jersey Turnpike Authority (NJTA) when the PTC completed the "Delaware River Extension" of the Pennsylvania Turnpike between

Valley Forge Valley Forge functioned as the third of eight winter encampments for the Continental Army's main body, commanded by General officer, General George Washington, during the American Revolutionary War. In September 1777, Congress fled Philadelphi ...

and Bristol Township in 1955, while the NJTA built the NJ Turnpike between

Penns Grove Penns Grove is a borough in Salem County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States census, the borough's population was 5,147,Ridgefield Park between 1950 and 1952. While the Pennsylvania Turnpike itself predates its New Jersey counterpart by over 10 years (the original Irwin-Carlisle section opened in 1940), the expansion of the Pennsylvania Turnpike to a cross-state highway was put on hold for the duration of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. Starting with the upsurge of automobile traffic in 1946, the Pennsylvania Turnpike expanded from the original highway west from

Irwin Irwin may refer to: Places ;United States * Irwin, California * Irwin, Idaho * Irwin, Illinois * Irwin, Iowa * Irwin, Nebraska * Irwin, Ohio * Irwin, Pennsylvania * Irwin, South Carolina * Irwin County, Georgia * Irwin Township, Venango Co ...

to the

Ohio Ohio () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Of the List of states and territories of the United States, fifty U.S. states, it is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 34th-l ...

border and east from

Carlisle Carlisle ( , ; from xcb, Caer Luel) is a city that lies within the Northern English county of Cumbria, south of the Scottish border at the confluence of the rivers Eden, Caldew and Petteril. It is the administrative centre of the City ...

to Valley Forge. At the same time, New Jersey, lacking a high-speed corridor, undertook the building of the New Jersey Turnpike under the auspices of then-

Governor of New Jersey The governor of New Jersey is the head of government of New Jersey. The office of governor is an elected position with a four-year term. There is a two consecutive term term limit, with no limitation on non-consecutive terms. The official re ...

Alfred E. Driscoll. In order to provide a high-speed, low-interruption route from

to the

Midwest The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of the United States. ...

, both the PTC and the NJTA undertook the building of the Delaware River–Turnpike Toll Bridge (known locally as the "Turnpike Connector Bridge") to connect the two highways. A local

AAA AAA, Triple A, or Triple-A is a three-letter initialism or abbreviation which may refer to: Airports * Anaa Airport in French Polynesia (IATA airport code AAA) * Logan County Airport (Illinois) (FAA airport code AAA) Arts, entertainment, and ...

chapter spearheaded a failed effort to have the bridge named after

William Penn William Penn ( – ) was an English writer and religious thinker belonging to the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, a North American colony of England. He was an early advocate of democracy an ...

. To maintain the "high-speed, low-interruption" characteristics ("low interruption" referring to the few stops needed to pay tolls or fuel up at the numerous full-service plazas on both routes), the new bridge was designed from the beginning as a high-level crossing. This sharply contrasts with the Tacony–Palmyra Bridge and the Burlington–Bristol Bridge located downstream as they are both

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 moveable ...

s, and are subject to frequent openings to allow large ships up and down stream (all other bridges downstream from the Delaware River–Turnpike Toll Bridge are high level crossings). On January 3, 2016, the

Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) is an agency created in 1937 to construct, finance, operate, and maintain the Pennsylvania Turnpike (both the mainline and the Northeast Extension). The commission consists of five members. Four membe ...

implemented cashless tolling via either

E-ZPass E-ZPass is an electronic toll collection system used on toll roads, toll bridges, and toll tunnels in the Eastern United States, Midwestern United States, and Southern United States. The E-ZPass Interagency Group (IAG) consists of member agenci ...

or TOLL BY PLATE, which uses

automatic license plate recognition Automatic number-plate recognition (ANPR; see also other names below) is a technology that uses optical character recognition on images to read vehicle registration plates to create vehicle location data. It can use existing closed-circuit te ...

to take a photo of the vehicle's license plate and mail a bill to the vehicle owner. The toll is collected only from traffic crossing into Pennsylvania, as with the other bridges across the Delaware River. On January 20, 2017, the bridge was closed after a fracture was discovered in a steel component. On February 3, 2017, Pennsylvania Turnpike officials announced that the bridge would remain closed until at least April 2017. The failure was located in an

I-beam An I-beam, also known as H-beam (for universal column, UC), w-beam (for "wide flange"), universal beam (UB), rolled steel joist (RSJ), or double-T (especially in Polish, Bulgarian, Spanish, Italian and German), is a beam with an or -shaped cr ...

located approximately above ground on the Pennsylvania side and caused the bridge to drop by about . Steel plates were installed as a temporary patch to stabilize the bridge and prevent further movement. The Assistant Chief Engineer for the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission stated that ..."the crack likely was caused by a combination of factors, including age and plug welds that were commonly used in the 1950s to fill mistakenly drilled holes." The bridge reopened to traffic on March 9, 2017, with unseasonably warm weather helping speed up work in repairing the bridge. On September 22, 2018, the bridge became part of

when the

Pennsylvania Turnpike/Interstate 95 Interchange Project The Pennsylvania Turnpike/Interstate 95 Interchange Project is an ongoing road construction project to build an interchange where Interstate 95 (I-95) crosses the Pennsylvania Turnpike in Bristol Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, in the Unite ...

's first components of construction were completed. Previously, the Pennsylvania side of the bridge was considered part of

Interstate 276 The Pennsylvania Turnpike (Penna Turnpike or PA Turnpike) is a toll highway operated by the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. A controlled-access highway, it runs for across the state. The turnpike's ...

Maintenance

The Turnpike Connector bridge is operated jointly by the PTC and the NJTA, neither of which is subject to the interstate rules and regulations of the other dual-state authorities —

Delaware River Port Authority The Delaware River Port Authority (DRPA), officially the Delaware River Port Authority of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, is a bi-state agency instrumentality created by a congressionally approved interstate compact between the governments of Penn ...

(DRPA);

Burlington County Bridge Commission The Burlington County Bridge Commission is a public agency responsible for the operation and maintenance of several bridges in Burlington County, New Jersey, United States, across the Delaware River. It now manages eight bridges, including the T ...

(BCBC);

Delaware River and Bay Authority The Delaware River and Bay Authority or DRBA is a bi-state government agency of the U.S. states of New Jersey and Delaware established by an interstate compact in 1962. The authority operates the Delaware Memorial twin suspension bridges, th ...

(DRBA); and the

Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission The Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission (DRJTBC) is a bistate, public agency that maintains and operates river crossings connecting the U.S. states of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The agency's jurisdiction stretches roughly along the Del ...

(DRJTBC) — which operate nearly all other bridges across the Delaware River (except for the

Dingman's Ferry Bridge The Dingmans Bridge (also known as the Dingman's Ferry Bridge) is a toll bridge across the Delaware River between Delaware Township, Pennsylvania and Sandyston Township, New Jersey. Owned and operated by the Dingmans Choice and Delaware Bridg ...

, which is privately owned). Each state is responsible for its half of the bridge up to the state line (as evident in a recent redecking project in which the PTC redecked its half of the bridge with fresh concrete first, with the NJTA following later in a separate project). In 2011, the NJTA and PTC undertook an investigation of the existing suspender system on the main span. Based on destructive testing of suspenders from the similar

Newark Bay Bridge The Newark Bay Bridge, officially the Vincent R. Casciano Memorial Bridge, is a steel through arch bridge that is continuous across three spans. It crosses Newark Bay and connects the cities of Newark (in Essex County) and Bayonne (in Hudson Coun ...

, consultants

HNTB HNTB Corporation is an American infrastructure design firm. Founded in 1914 in Kansas City, Missouri, HNTB began with the partnership made by Ernest Emmanuel Howard with the firm Waddell & Harrington, founded in 1907. Considered as one of the ...

determined that the Delaware River bridge's suspenders had limited remaining service life and needed to be replaced. At each suspender location, the load from each original wire rope was transferred into a set of four new wire ropes, after which the original suspender was cut. The project was completed in August 2013.

Future construction

The final component of the direct interchange project between the

and

in Bristol Township is the replacement of the Delaware River Bridge. As originally planned, a second, parallel span of the bridge identical in appearance to the original 1956 span was to be constructed. However, in March 2020 the New Jersey Turnpike Authority announced in their capital improvement plan that the 1956 span will be replaced and a new study will be formed to determine the design of the new roadways. The new bridge is not planned to begin construction until at least 2025.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Delaware River-Turnpike Toll Bridge Through arch bridges in the United States Continuous truss bridges in the United States Toll bridges in New Jersey Toll bridges in Pennsylvania Bridges over the Delaware River Interstate 95 Bridges completed in 1956 Bridges in Burlington County, New Jersey Bridges in Bucks County, Pennsylvania Tolled sections of Interstate Highways Road bridges in New Jersey Road bridges in Pennsylvania New Jersey Turnpike Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission Bridges on the Interstate Highway System Steel bridges in the United States Interstate vehicle bridges in the United States

History

Maintenance

Future construction

See also

References

External links