Williamsburg Bridge
The Williamsburg Bridge is a suspension bridge across the East River in New York City, connecting the Lower East Side of Manhattan with the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn. Originally known as the East River Bridge, the Williamsburg Bridge was completed in 1903 and, at long, was the longest suspension bridge span in the world until 1924.
Proposed in January 1892, the bridge project was approved in 1895. Work began on June 19, 1896, under chief engineer Leffert L. Buck. Despite delays and funding shortfalls, the bridge opened on December 19, 1903. In addition to roads, walkways, and New York City Subway tracks, the bridge had four trolley tracks, which were replaced with roads in 1936 and 1949. The bridge underwent a substantial renovation in the 1980s and 1990s following the discovery of severe structural defects, and it was again being renovated in the 2020s.
The Williamsburg Bridge's main span is long and is carried on four main cables, which are suspended from two towers. Unlike similar suspension bridges, the side spans are supported by trusswork and additional towers. The deck carries eight lanes of vehicular traffic, two subway tracks, and two walkway and bike paths that merge in Manhattan. The bridge is one of four vehicular bridges directly connecting Manhattan Island and Long Island, along with the Queensboro Bridge to the north and the Manhattan and Brooklyn bridges to the south. The bridge also serves as a connector highway to and from the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway in Brooklyn.
Development
Planning
Legislation to incorporate the East River Bridge Company was introduced in the New York State Legislature in January 1892. The company wished to build a suspension bridge across the East River from Manhattan, within New York City, to the then-separate city of Brooklyn. The company was incorporated on March 9, 1892. The East River Bridge Company, led by Frederick Uhlmann, was authorized to construct two bridges from Manhattan to Brooklyn, one of which would run to Broadway in the Eastern District of Brooklyn. The United States Secretary of War approved the span to Williamsburg in January 1893 under the condition that the bridge be at least high at its center.The East River Bridge Company's capital stock was set at $2 million in mid-1893, and three men were appointed as bridge commissioners. An elevated rapid transit line on the bridge was approved in September. The commissioners submitted a report on the planned bridge to the New York Supreme Court in October, but the Supreme Court ruled in January 1894 that the $2 million in capital stock was not sufficient to fund the bridge's construction. The East River Bridge Company dug a hole for one of the bridge's piers in Brooklyn on February 15, 1894, to prevent the company's charter from expiring. The New York Court of Appeals, the state's high court, upheld the Supreme Court ruling October. The company's directors held a meeting that November to devise a timeline for the bridge's construction. Concurrently, a London-based firm offered to finance the bridge, and the company moved to condemn a property in the path of the bridge's Manhattan approach.
In March 1895, Charles A. Schieren, mayor of Brooklyn, requested that his corporation council draft a bill for the East River Bridge between Broadway in Brooklyn and Grand Street in Manhattan. The same month, the State Legislature considered a bill to terminate the East River Bridge Company's charter. Schieren and New York City mayor William L. Strong agreed in April to jointly fund the bridge and appoint a group of commissioners. Schieren appointed three commissioners that June, and the commissioners proposed hiring an engineer and issuing bonds the next month. Uhlmann proposed turning over his company's assets to the commissioners, who initially rejected his offer. The commission decided to buy Uhlmann's charter in December 1895. A State Supreme Court justice issued an injunction against this purchase in March 1896; this decision was reversed on appeal, and another Supreme Court justice ratified this purchase that June.
Initial construction
Borings and land negotiations
was hired as the East River Bridge's chief engineer at the beginning of August 1895. The next month, a contractor was hired to create five preliminary borings for the bridge. Early the next year, the mayors of Brooklyn and New York City agreed to appropriate $250,000 each for the bridge's construction. Buck presented revised plans for the East River Bridge in February 1896, lowering its maximum height to. The revisions were approved by the War Department and the New York Harbor Line Board shortly thereafter, and the commissioners decided to issue $1 million in bonds to fund construction. In March, the East River Bridge Commission requested bids for the excavation of holes for the bridge's caissons. As workers excavated the holes, Buck prepared plans for the bridge's anchorages and piers.As late as June 1896, the commissioners considered placing the bridge's Manhattan terminus at Grand Street. That month, the commissioners decided to move the bridge's Manhattan terminus to Delancey and Clinton streets to avoid the narrowness of Grand Street. In Brooklyn, the approach was straightened to avoid the Williamsburgh Savings Bank Building. Work on the bridge commenced in earnest on June 19, 1896, when contractors began excavating holes for the towers' foundations in the East River. The final plans were adopted on July 22, allowing the commissioners to request bids for construction contracts. Buck's plans were adopted that August. By September 1896, the bridge's completion had been delayed by one year due to a lack of money. The Brooklyn government and the New York City government both attempted to sell bonds to little avail.
As part of the Williamsburg Bridge's construction, a strip of land next to Delancey Street was to be condemned. This strip included St. Rose of Lima Church, several schools, and Dutch row houses. The bridge commissioners took over a ferry slip at the end of Delancey Street that had belonged to the Brooklyn and New York Ferry Company in October 1896. In Williamsburg, the bridge commissioners considered either closing or widening South 5th Street. The commissioners negotiated with the American Sugar Refining Company to acquire the latter's land on the Brooklyn shoreline; the commissioners offered the company $350,000 in late 1896, but the firm refused to sell. Negotiations for the land in Brooklyn were still ongoing, complicated by that city's lack of money.
Caisson and anchorage contracts
The commissioners requested bids for the caissons in October 1896, and Patrick H. Flynn received the contract for the caissons the same month. Flynn obtained land at North 2nd Street in Brooklyn soon afterward and manufactured his caissons at a shipyard there. Caisson workers toiled in three eight-hour shifts of 30 to 50 men each. After the caissons were complete, they were floated to either side of the river. During February 1897, the bridge commissioners took over the land at the end of Delancey Street. New York governor Frank S. Black signed two bills in May 1897, which allowed the bridge commissioners to lease space under the approaches and close part of South 5th Street for the bridge's Brooklyn approach. The first caisson was completed the same month and towed to Delancey Street in Manhattan on May 15. The contract for the Brooklyn suspension tower's foundation was put up for bidding the following day. A cofferdam was built around each caisson to prevent them from being flooded, and workers excavated dirt for the foundations from within the caissons. Colin McLean was hired to build the Brooklyn suspension tower's foundations in June, and the last of the bridge's four caissons was launched in December 1897.The state legislature passed a bill in May 1897 to straighten the bridge's Brooklyn approach. The East River Bridge Commission paid the American Sugar Refining Company $350,000 for their land in July. The next month, the mayors of Brooklyn and New York City sued several property owners whose land was in the path of the bridge's approaches, and a judge ruled that one Brooklyn landowner who had refused to sell had to give up their land. The commissioners began soliciting bids for the anchorages in September. The Degnon-McLean Construction Company was hired to build the Brooklyn anchorage; a state judge refused to re-award the contract to a competing bidder. Shanly & Ryan, who had been hired to build the Manhattan anchorage, began constructing their anchorage that October. The next month, the bridge commissioners obtained underwater land on the Brooklyn side for the bridge's abutments.
Progress between 1898 and 1901
By the end of 1897, Brooklyn and Manhattan were about to be merged into the City of Greater New York. The first mayor of the unified city, Robert Anderson Van Wyck, removed the existing bridge commissioners in January 1898, citing extravagance and delays; he appointed six new commissioners. The old commissioners' removal prompted state legislation for their reinstatement and a lawsuit against the New York City government. A New York Supreme Court justice ruled in June that the old commissioners had to be reinstated, although the decision was overturned on appeal the following month. A state senator proposed a bipartisan state commission in January 1899 to oversee the bridge's construction, but the bill was rejected. The state's high court, the New York Court of Appeals, ruled against the original commissioners in February 1899. Following the passage of further legislation in 1901, the East River Bridge commissioners were replaced with the city's Commissioner of Bridges effective January 1, 1902.There had been several deaths during construction, with the first fatal accident in December 1897. Another worker was killed by a derrick's boom in 1898; two workers were killed in separate falls from the bridge in May 1900; the main steelwork engineer died after falling from the Brooklyn approach in September 1900; and a foreman drowned in March 1902.