The San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge, CA, USA – eastern span

Abstract

With daily traffic of 260 000 vehicles, the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge is a major connection in the San Francisco Bay area (CA, USA). The new bridge is a designated lifeline structure (to remain open for emergency traffic after a major seismic event) with a design life of 150 years. The new bridge is 3.6 km long and consists of four distinct structures: a low-rise post-tensioned concrete box girder near the Oakland shore; a 2.4 km long segmental concrete box girder (skyway); a first-of-its-kind self-anchored suspension (SAS) bridge with a 385 m main span over the navigational channel; and a post-tensioned concrete box girder that connects to the east portal of the Yerba Buena Island tunnel. Opened in 2013, the signature span of the bridge is the SAS bridge with a length of 624 m and a total deck width of 79 m accommodating ten lanes of traffic in addition to a bike/pedestrian path. The US$6.4 billion megaproject was procured under multiple contracts and was delivered using the traditional design–bid–build method. This paper describes the key design innovations and construction methods which address the unique challenges on this project.