New Willis Avenue Bridge Floats Down Hudson

[Bx41 Wakefield]

The new Willis Avenue bridge made it's journey through the Mid-Hudson Valley yesterday traveling down the Hudson River on its way to New York City.

 

SAUGERTIES' date=' N.Y. — Kent Waddell started his day Tuesday by heading to the Hudson River with his bloodworms and fishing rod. But he saw something on the river that made him race home and put his fishing gear away.

 

“It’s not every day you see a huge steel bridge floating down the Hudson,” said Mr. Waddell, 69, a retired engineer from West Hurley, N.Y., who had ambled down a woodsy path to the Saugerties Lighthouse, on the west shore of the Hudson, just as a prefabricated steel bridge about 350 feet long, 65 feet high and 77 feet wide was slipping downriver, propped on huge barges guided by three powerful tugboats.

 

Its eventual destination is the Harlem River in New York City, to replace the nearly 110-year-old Willis Avenue Bridge linking Manhattan and the South Bronx. This was a crucial day in a decade-long, $612 million project, but for Mr. Waddell, it simply meant the chase was on. He spent the rest of the day hopping in and out of his car and chasing the slow-moving bridge down the river.

 

And like Mr. Waddell, there were hordes of onlookers along the Hudson’s shores, tipped off to this bridge-on-a-barge spectacle by local newspapers and word of mouth. Mr. Waddell joined them at vantage points like the Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge and the Walkway Over the Hudson footbridge park in Poughkeepsie, to monitor the progress of the bridge getting a pristine promenading down nearly the entire length of the navigable Hudson, as if to give the people of New York State a sneak preview of what New York City residents would be driving on...[/size'][/Quote]

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/14/nyregion/14bridge.html?src=me

 

Some onlookers posted their photos in the Walkway Over The Hudson Facebook group.

 

http://www.facebook.com/walkwayoverthehudson#!/photo_search.php?oid=76399620004&view=all

[Shortline Bus]

The new Willis Avenue bridge made it's journey through the Mid-Hudson Valley yesterday traveling down the Hudson River on its way to New York City.

 

 

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/14/nyregion/14bridge.html?src=me

 

Some onlookers posted their photos in the Walkway Over The Hudson Facebook group.

 

http://www.facebook.com/walkwayoverthehudson#!/photo_search.php?oid=76399620004&view=all

 

Hey i live in mid hudson valley and played a role in this new bridge (Not!)

Finallly when this new bridge is put in, I no longer have to worry about getting a flat tire or screwing my shocks on the soon to be gone oringal Willis Ave. Bridge.

[Bx41 Wakefield]

Hey i live in mid hudson valley and played a role in this new bridge (Not!)

Finallly when this new bridge is put in, I no longer have to worry about getting a flat tire or screwing my shocks on the soon to be gone oringal Willis Ave. Bridge.

 

LOL. I wanted to try and get down there and pics of the bridge going but I didn't feel like standing in the rain, lol.