Results tagged “bridge”

       

Yesterday was the Manhattan Bridge's centennial and the celebrations were capped off by fireworks. Check out these photographs from our readers.

A reader just sent us this picture—showing a truck apparently stuck at an angle— at the Verrazano Narrows Bridge toll plaza with the prediction, "The Verrazano is gonna be backed up."

It's all happening, the Queensboro Bridge is being celebrated for making it to 100! Last night some folks were treated to a fireworks show around 9 p.m. (pictured), which closed out yesterday's festivities (though there are many more to come).

It's Queensboro Bridge celebration time! The East River crossing between Manhattan and Queens turns 100 today, and there have been a number of events today, which will be capped off by some Fireworks by Grucci at 9:15 p.m. According to the Centennial Events page, they will be set off "from the tip of Roosevelt Island" and will be "viewable from the FDR Drive Promenade and Pavilion Park in Manhattan; Roosevelt Island, in Queens at Gantry Park, and Water Taxi Park and the Greenpoint and Williamsburg waterfront in Brooklyn." There are more events this week and might we remind you of Nick Carraway's declaration in The Great Gatsby, when he and Jay Gatsby head into the city over the bridge, "The city seen from the Queensboro Bridge is always the city seen for the first time, in its first wild promise of all the mystery and the beauty in the world."

Finally, the day has arrived...at a ceremony this morning the Triborough Bridge will officially become the Robert F. Kennedy bridge, one day before what would have been his 83rd birthday. Former President Bill Clinton, Governor David Paterson, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Kennedy's widow, Ethel, are all expected to be on hand at the official dedication, taking place at Astoria Park in Queens. After the signs are up and formalities are done with, will anyone actually call it the RFK? Even Google is still calling it the Triborough. Newsday reminds us that the (ironic and expensive) "renaming of the bridge was the brainchild of former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer." Enough said?

There's been many opinions tossed around regarding the name change of the Triborough Bridge to the Robert F. Kennedy bridge, but like it or not it's all goin' down on November 19th. NYMag notes that there's a bit of irony surrounding the change, however, saying "there’s no reason to think Kennedy, an environmentalist before his time, would have wanted his name associated with the notorious bottleneck site." Columbia University's Kenneth T. Jackson says, "with the MTA facing a billion-dollar deficit, I think Bobby Kennedy would be calling for us to find ways to save the planet and run more buses and subways rather than spend money to change signage." Maybe that's all just more opinion, but he goes on to say that RFK "believed, appropriately, that cars didn’t belong in New York." Even RFK, Jr. agrees that there's some irony surrounding the naming, but says his father would have appreciated the honor nonetheless. The $4 million honor.

Just because congestion pricing didn't pass doesn't mean that tolls aren't possible on East River crossings: WCBS 2 reports that the MTA is considering tolling all Brooklyn, Manhattan, Williamsburg, and 59th Street Bridges in order to deal with its huge budget gaps. Transportation engineer Sam Schwartz points out, "We already have tolls at the Battery Tunnel, Midtown Tunnel, the Triborough Bridge let's put pricing on all of the crossings in between... People coming into the city should be paying for some of the service they get." Tolling the four bridges might raise $1 billion; another possibilitiy is "to have tolls only during morning and evening rush hours." And about congestion pricing...given the city's financial picture, "A top transit source told CBS 2 HD the mayor's full congestion pricing plan is also back on the table. " Snap!

Yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg and other city officials unveiled the newly renovated access path between Highbridge Park and the High Bridge in Manhattan.

Earlier this year, vintners Paul Wegimont and Greg Sandor opened Bridge Urban Winery, an offshoot of their North Fork vineyard. Nestled by the Williamsburg Bridge in a blossoming artisanal corridor that includes Marlow & Sons and Diner, their sleek yet cozy wine bar specializes in strictly New York State wine, as well as food pairings prepared with all locally-sourced ingredients.

Despite formidable barricades, sensors, alarms and surveillance cameras, 13 “ravenous ruminants” recently succeeded in infiltrating a restricted area near the base of the Verrazano Bridge without triggering alarms, the Daily News reports. During the summer, the goats are kept at Staten Island's Fort Wadsworth because they excel at eating weeds and other vegetation that gets into cracks of the historic structures there.

In January former Governor Spitzer addressed the idea of former New York senator Robert F. Kennedy claiming name to the Triborough Bridge. It immediately rose questions about RFK's carpetbagger status, and his importance (or lack thereof) to New York's history.

Two weeks ago, during the festivities for the Brooklyn Bridge's 125th birthday, a mysterious and massive device was unveiled with little fanfare near the base of the bridge. Called the Telectroscope, the installation was said to optically connect passersby at either end of a forgotten tunnel between Brooklyn and London (near the Tower Bridge). The British artist behind the project, Paul St George, says he's merely fulfilling the Victorian-era dream of his great-grandfather, inventor Alexander Stanhope St George, who left behind designs for the telectroscope, as well as the secret, unfinished trans-Atlantic tunnel.

As Bike Month NYC winds down, over two thousand cyclists filled the Brooklyn streets yesterday for the fourth annual Tour de Brooklyn. This year’s 18-mile family-oriented ride was moved up a week to coincide with the Brooklyn Bridge 125th birthday festivities. Borough President Marty Markowitz kicked things off on Water Street near the bridge, sending cyclists on a leisurely ride that wound through DUMBO, East Williamsburg, Crown Heights, Bedford Stuyvesant, and the Evergreen Cemetery, ultimately wrapping up downtown at Walt Whitman Park.

      

The festivities commemorating the 125th birthday of the Brooklyn Bridge got underway full swing today with the unveiling of the mysterious Telectroscope at the Fulton Ferry Landing, just south of the bridge at 1 Water Street. The installation's creator, Paul St George, claims to have just completed a forgotten tunnel connecting New York to London and, using giant parabolic mirrors, has reconstructed a Victorian-era optical device enabling people on either end of the tube to wave at each other.

        

Responding to years of griping (and vigilante sign-making) about the poorly lit, hard-to-locate pedestrian entrances to the Brooklyn Bridge in DUMBO, the city has finally gotten around to putting up some new signs guiding walkers to the bridge. Spearheaded by the DUMBO Improvement District, the makeover was unveiled today by Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz and other officials, and coincides with the bridge’s 125th birthday celebration, which kicks off tomorrow at the Empire-Fulton Ferry State Park in Brooklyn with live music by the Brooklyn Philharmonic, Grucci fireworks, and “an unprecedented light installation spanning the length of the Brooklyn Bridge.”

The most intriguing part of the Brooklyn Bridge 125th birthday party announced last week is the mysterious Telectroscope, located at Brooklyn’s Fulton Ferry Landing near the bridge. In this case the mystery is quite deliberate; the installation’s creator Paul St George has crafted a whimsical back story for the device, which purports to connect New Yorkers with Londoners using giant parabolic mirrors installed in a forgotten Trans-Atlantic tunnel. UPDATE: More photos here.

The 125th birthday of the Brooklyn Bridge will be observed this month with a five day celebration from May 22nd through May 26th, Mayor Bloomberg and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz announced earlier this week. Completed in 1883, the bridge opened with a “People’s Day” celebration; for a penny toll the general public was permitted to traverse its span. (A few days later, on Memorial Day, 12 pedestrians were trampled to death when the crowd believed the bridge was collapsing and panicked.)

With approximately 30,000 participants, it's not unexpected that a few cyclists might get in an accident during the 5 Boro Bike Tour. Still, it's alarming to read emergency wire updates like the report that there was an accident on the Queens side of the upper level of the Queensboro Bridge. Multiple cyclists are down and the extent of injuries is still unkown.

      

Between 2008 and the end of 2010, six New York City bridges will turn 100 years old, and the newly formed New York City Bridge Centennial Commission will be making sure they're adequately feted. The six centennial spans are the Madison Avenue, Manhattan, Borden Avenue, Pelham Bay, University Heights and Queensboro bridges.