The California Department of Transportation reopened a major bridge that connects San Francisco and Bay Area cities early on Tuesday morning before work rush hour resumed after the Labor Day weekend.
After predictions that bridge repairs of an unexpected crack in the steel support would take until Wednesday to get fixed, transportation inspectors gave the bridge the all-clear for reopening the bridge on Tuesday morning. The Bay Bridge is one the busiest bridges in the world.
The bridge closed for seismic retrofit work last week and San Francisco commuters altered travel patterns to avoid traffic congestion ahead of the week after the Labor Day weekend.
Construction crews were able to replace a 300-foot section of the eastern span of the bridge, a portion of which collapsed during an earthquake in 1989. The S-shaped replacement section that provides a detour of the eastern section of the span was finished on schedule.
But an unrelated two-inch crack was discovered in a one of the circular support beams, known as an eye-bar, also in the same section of the span.
A number of transit agencies worked to accommodate commuters who use the bridge and usually number up to 250,000 on non-holiday weekends and fewer over Labor Day. The bridge is also a major traffic artery that connects Oakland and eastern suburban communities, San Francisco, and the western peninsula.
California Department of Transportation spokesperson Bart Ney said that the crew toiled day and night over the Labor Day weekend to repair the bridge.
“We had to fabricate a new piece for the fix, and we didn’t have the fabricator yet,” Ney said.
One of the subcontractors working on the bridge opened up its shop overnight to build the necessary piece, the spokesman said. The repair had to be fully inspected before the bridge could be reopened.
Inspectors gave the all-clear one day ahead of schedule, according to Ney.
“It became a scramble to clean up the bridge and put it in working order.”
California Highway Patrol spokesman said that after the bridge was reopened on Tuesday morning the traffic was light, because “many individuals had alternative routes planned today.”
Message signs were used to direct traffic through the detours over the weekend, and highway lanes were restricted to control higher volumes of traffic. However, transportation officials beefed up public transportation. Ferry companies added boats, and the region’s railway rapid transit BART added longer trains to stave off traffic congestion.
The bridge closure is scheduled to be fully completed in 2013. Meantime, traffic will flow on a half-mile long detour connecting the new eastern section of the bridge to the Yerba Buena Island Tunnel for three or four years while the old approach to the Tunnel is demolished.
“So far the motorists are navigating the curves well and are generally obeying the reduced speed limit,” a highway patrol spokesman said. “It might be a little more challenging because of the reduced visibility.”
