Ben Franklin Bridge at sunrise
Ben Franklin Bridge at night
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The Benjamin Franklin Bridge – known informally as the Ben Franklin Bridge and originally named the Delaware River Bridge – is a suspension bridge across the Delaware River connecting Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Camden, New Jersey. Named for American founding father Benjamin Franklin, the bridge is owned and operated by the Delaware River Port Authority.
[edit] History and use
The chief engineer of the bridge was Polish-born Ralph Modjeski, its design engineer was Leon Moisseiff, and the supervising architect was Paul Philippe Cret. At its completion on July 1, 1926, its 1,750 foot (533 meter) span made it the world's longest suspension bridge span, a distinction it would hold until the opening of the Ambassador Bridge in 1929.
The bridge currently carries highways I-676 and US 30, the latter since its opening or very soon thereafter. Before the 1953 New Jersey State Highway renumbering, Route 25, Route 43 and Route 45 ended in the middle of the bridge. The bridge also carries the Port Authority Transit Corporation's Lindenwold High-Speed Line (PATCO Speedline) via connecting tunnels on both sides of the bridge.
Pedestrian walkways run along both sides of the bridge, elevated over and separated from the vehicular lanes; of these, only one is open at a time. Walkway hours are 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. The DRPA temporarily closed the walkways to the public the day after the 7 July 2005 London bombings, citing security concerns. The DRPA also closes the walkway after snowfall, or if the weather forecast includes a chance of snowfall, and closed it in late August 2011 during Hurricane Irene.
The westbound approach to the bridge shows the zipper barrier and the overhead gantry lights
The seven vehicular lanes are divided by a concrete "zipper" barrier, which can be mechanically moved to configure the lanes for traffic volume or construction. Red and green signals mounted on overhead gantries indicate which lanes are open or closed to traffic in each direction. The lights indicate closures for construction, accidents or breakdown as well as traffic separation. Generally, during the morning rush hour, there are four lanes open westbound and three eastbound, with the situation reversed during the evening rush hour. Before the zipper barrier was installed, one lane of the bridge was kept closed at peak times to reduce the risk of head-on collisions as there was no physical barrier separating east and westbound traffic.
The bridge's original design included six vehicular lanes and two streetcar tracks on the main deck, with provision for a rapid transit track in each direction outboard of the deck's stiffening trusses, which rise above the deck rather than lie beneath it. The tracks were built to the nonstandard broad gauge of the Public Service Company of New Jersey's Camden streetcar system;[citation needed] the design called for the cars to cross the bridge from Camden to Philadelphia, enter an underground terminal beneath the bridge's west entrance plaza, and return to Camden via the opposite track. Streetcar stations were also built in the bridge's anchorages. None of the streetcar facilities were ever placed in service, as Public Service ran no cars across the bridge from its opening until the company abandoned its Camden streetcar system in 1932; after that, the tracks were removed[citation needed] and the space converted to vehicular lanes. The outer pair of rapid transit tracks went into service in 1936 with the opening of the Bridge Line subway connecting Broadway and City Hall in Camden with 8th and Market streets in Philadelphia; the Bridge Line, extended to 16th and Locust in 1952, began carrying PATCO trains in 1969.
Along with the Betsy Ross, Walt Whitman, and Tacony-Palmyra Bridges, the Benjamin Franklin is one of four primary vehicular bridges between Philadelphia and southern New Jersey. The Commodore Barry Bridge in Delaware County, Pennsylvania and the Burlington-Bristol Bridge in Bucks County, Pennsylvania connect suburban Philadelphia with southern New Jersey.
- A $5.00 one-way toll is charged entering Pennsylvania for passenger vehicles (less than 7,000 lb (3,200 kg) gross vehicle weight).
- A $6 credit will be given on a per-tag basis for any DRPA-issued E-ZPass tag that crosses one of the four DRPA bridges 18 times in a calendar month.[1]
- Trucks, commercial vehicles, mobile homes, and recreation vehicles (weighing at least 7,000 lb (3,200 kg). gross vehicle weight), pay $7 per axle.
- Seniors aged 65 and over can use a ticket program to pay $2 per trip (not integrated with E-ZPass).
[edit] In popular culture
- A 2006 production of the musical Godspell at the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia, directed by Ryan Oczkowski, was set under the Franklin Bridge, with Jesus' followers portrayed as living in a shack there.
- The bridge is one of the landmarks seen in the opening credits of the television series It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- Notes
[edit] External links
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