Motorists Told To Plan Ahead For Bay Bridge Closure
State transportation officials are warning motorists to find alternate routes around the Bay Area next week through Labor Day weekend while workers ready the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge.
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State transportation officials are warning motorists to find alternate routes around the Bay Area next week through Labor Day weekend while workers ready the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge.
California Gov. Jerry Brown will not attend the opening of the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge, which is set for the day after Labor Day.
Drivers approaching the Bay Bridge from Interstate 880 or West Grand Avenue and who use FasTrak to pay for tolls will be detoured this weekend, as Caltrans and the Bay Area Toll Authority add a new FasTrak lane on the span.
In addition to being safer during earthquakes, drivers will have a better overall experience when they drive across the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge when it opens in two weeks, a bridge spokesman said Tuesday.
Crews installed a series of temporary steel shims under the deck of the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge over the weekend. The steel plates will allow the new bridge to open to traffic on schedule.
Despite broken earthquake-safety bolts that threatened months of delays, California transportation officials have voted to open the new eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge around the Labor Day weekend as originally planned.
KPIX 5 News will broadcast "Wind, Water & Steel: The New Bay Bridge" on Friday, August 23rd at 9:30 p.m. In addition, the special will be rebroadcast on KPIX 5 on Saturday, August 24th at 9pm, Saturday August 31st at 5pm and on KBCW on Sunday, September 1st at 5pm.
Twenty-four years after the Loma Prieta earthquake, billions of dollars later and - most recently - a bit of drama over bad bolts, multiple well-placed transportation sources told KPIX 5 on Wednesday evening that the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge will indeed open on Labor Day weekend.
The opening date for the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge, which initially had been set for Labor Day and then was pushed back to December or later, will be announced on Thursday.
The federal government is giving the California Dept. of Transportation approval to move ahead on a plan to fix bad bolts on the Bay Bridge, KPIX 5 has learned, and the solution could allow the bridge to reopen as originally planned just after the Labor Day Weekend.
Lanes on westbound Interstate Highway 80 just west of the Bay Bridge reopened Monday afternoon, following a big-rig fire that led to a nightmarish commute for many in the Bay Area.
The corrosion tests are meant to see how the rods will perform over decades and under tension.
The new Bay Bridge will be more than cement and suspension. Arborists are canvassing Bay Area neighborhoods in search of the perfect palm.
A suspicious device forced authorities to temporarily shut the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge on Friday afternoon, snarling traffic on both sides of the bridge.
Four family members touring San Francisco in small go-carts ended up getting stranded halfway across the Bay Bridge and had to be picked up, according to a published report.
A bridge engineering expert told a Bay Area transportation panel Wednesday that a short-term fix could allow the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge to open on schedule by Labor Day after all.
The status of the anchor rods on the Bay Bridge and an updated construction schedule for the new eastern span are set to be presented at a special meet Wednesday of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.
Now that the opening of the new Bay Bridge has been delayed for several months, a $5.6 million celebration planned in honor of the span is also in limbo, and it may not happen at all.
The eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge will not open as scheduled on Labor Day as it will take contractors until at least December to repair cracks in the bridge's seismic safety bolts.
Next Wednesday, July 10, is the day local transportation officials have said they would announce if the new Bay Bridge will open as planned this Labor Day weekend.
Thousands more motorists have been crossing Bay Area bridges each day of an ongoing BART strike that started Monday, according to the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.
Bay Area Rapid Transit labor negotiations went into the early morning hours Wednesday, wrapping up shortly before 3 a.m., but with no resolution in sight Bay Area riders were facing another tough day navigating their commutes.
Police arrested four suspected gang members Sunday night after a shooting in San Francisco that led to a pursuit over the Bay Bridge and a crash into a church in Oakland, a police spokesman said Monday.
Steve Hemminger, executive director of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, on the BART strike, the Bay Bridge bolt fix and where alternative transit solutions stand in the Bay Area.
State officials have suspended the license of the pilot in charge of the boat that side swiped the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge last year for five months.
