 |
Business | Industries | Finance | Tax |
| Index: > A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z |
|
|||||
| First Prev [ 1 2 ] Next Last |
6016 feet (1834 m) long, it was opened for use on May 24, 1883, after 14 years of construction. On that first day a total of 1,800 vehicles and 150,300 people crossed. The bridge's main span over the East River is 1,595 feet (486 meters). The bridge cost $18 million to build and approximately 27 people died during its construction. A week after the opening, on May 30, a rumor that the Bridge was going to collapse caused a stampede which crushed twelve people.
At the time it opened, it was the longest suspension bridge in the world — fifty percent longer than any previously built, and has become a treasured landmark. Since the 1980s, it has been floodlit at night to display its architectural features. The architecture style is Gothic, with characteristic pointed arches above the passageways through the stone towers.
The bridge was designed by an architectural firm owned by John Augustus Roebling in Trenton, New Jersey. Roebling and his firm had built smaller suspension bridges, such as the John A. Roebling Suspension Bridge in Cincinnati, Ohio and the Waco Suspension Bridge in Waco, TexasWaco is the county seat of McLennan County, Texas. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 113,726. History Prior to its founding, Neil McLennan had settled in an area near the South Bosque River in 1838. Jacob De Cordova bought McLennan, that served as the engineering prototypes for the final design.
As construction was beginning, Roebling's foot was seriously injured in an accident; within a few weeks, he died of tetanusTetanus is a serious and often fatal disease caused by the exotoxin tetanospasmin which is produced by the Gram-positive, anaerobic bacterium Clostridium tetani''. It was first documented by Hippocrates, and records dating back to the 5th century BCE prov. His son, WashingtonWashington Augustus Roebling ( 26 May, 1837 21 July, 1926) was a United States civil engineer, best known for his work on the Brooklyn Bridge, started by his father John A. Washington Roebling was born in Saxonburg, Pennsylvania. After education at the th, succeeded him, but was stricken with caissonA caisson is: in engineering, a retaining structure used, for example, to work on the foundations of a bridge pier. These are constructed so that the water can be pumped out so the working environment is dry. Shallow caissons may be open to the air, while disease ( decompression sicknessAltitude-induced decompression sickness Decompression sickness DCS the bends or caisson disease is an injury caused by bubbles of gas forming in the tissues of the body after breathing gas at high pressure and then reducing the ambient pressure. DCS is mo), due to working in compressed air with the sand hogs, and was only capable of limited speech or movement. Washington's wife, Emily Warren RoeblingEmily Warren Roebling was the wife of John Augustus Roebling, designer of the Brooklyn Bridge., trained herself in engineering so she could communicate his wishes to the builders. Washington Roebling was unable to leave his home and watched the construction through a telescope.
At the time the bridge was built, the aerodynamics of bridge building had not been worked out. Bridges were not tested in wind tunnelsFluid dynamics A wind tunnel is a research tool developed to assist with studying the effects of air moving over or around solid objects. Air is blown or sucked through a duct equipped with a viewing port and instrumentation where models or geometrical sh until the 1950's - well after after the collapse of the Tacoma Narrows BridgeThe Tacoma Narrows Bridge is a mile-long suspension bridge with a span of 5,979 ft (the largest in the world when it was built) that carries Washington State Route 16 across the Tacoma Narrows of Puget Sound from Tacoma to Gig Harbor, Washington, USA. in the 1940. It is also fortunate that the open truss structure supporting the deck is by its nature less subject to aerodynamic problems. Roebling designed a bridge and truss system that was six times as strong as he thought it needed to be. Because of this, the Brooklyn Bridge is still standing when many of the bridges built around the same time have vanished into history and had been replaced. This is also in spite of the nefarious substitution of inferior quality wire in the cabling supplied by a contractor - by the time it was discovered it was too late to replace the cabling that had already been constructed. Roebling determined that the poorer wire would leave the bridge four rather than six times as strong as necessary, so it was eventually allowed to stand.
At various times, the bridge has carried horses and trolley traffic; at present, it has lanes for motor vehicles, and a separate level for pedestrians and bicycles.
References to "selling the Brooklyn Bridge" abound in American culture, sometimes as examples of rural gullibility but more often in connection with an idea that strains credulity. For example, "If you believe that, I have a wonderful bargain for you . . ." However, see also Victor Lustig.
The bridge was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on June 17, 1977 and on March 24, 1983 the bridge was designated a National Historic Engineering Landmark.
The construction of the Brooklyn Bridge is detailed in a film by Ken Burns.
| Politics | Business | Finance |
 |
 |
 |
|