A Bridge Worth Burning

Photos
A Bridge to Better Commutes
The opening of the new Woodrow Wilson Bridge tops off two difficult decades of community debate, Congressional-wrangling, consultant studies and blue-collar construction that many times seemed to be in serious trouble, before turning into a mega-project success story.

By the end of this weekend, the old Wilson Bridge will no longer carry drivers. They'll all switch over to the new span (half of the Capital Beltway is already there), and the old one will soon come down. In its place will be a second new span, and by the time that's completed in two years, the bridge will have doubled in size.

This is something of a monumental moment for the region.

That bridge, that awful, awful bridge, has done its 45-year duty and will be a-coming down soon after cars cross it for the last time. Kind of makes you nostalgic, doesn't it? Nah, me neither. But what does it make you think? What are your best or worst memories of the bridge?

F.J.K. wrote: While best memories have yet to be determined, worst memories come to mind quickly. I used to take the outer loop of the bridge to work in the mornings. Earlier this year, on a rainy Friday morning, just before the bridge, drivers in front of me failed to stop in time, causing a four-car fender-bender, with my car being the fourth. The bottoms of my pants legs were soaked by the time I got to work, as I'd stood in the rain gathering insurance information from the other drivers.

Cosmo wrote: Worst memories are easy. I commuted to a lousy job on the Maryland side for a year or so -- including the snowy day of the Air Florida crash in 1982, when it took almost two hours to make the five-mile trip back to Virginia.

A couple of years later, back working in Alexandria, a co-worker ran out of gas halfway across coming from Maryland. She must have walked the rest of the way across. Anyway, she called me from the gas station where she got a can of gas, and I picked her up, drove across to Maryland, looped around from one of the exits and pulled up behind her car on the shoulder.

Her driver-side mirror had been sheared off. We got the gas in the car and made it back across, but it was pretty scary. You think those big bridges are rock-solid until you stand still on one and feel yourself shaking from the vibrations as the cars zoom past.

I grew up in Old Town, and so whenever we came back from a family trip up North, the bridge was the very last bit of highway that we traveled before getting home -- in fact, we'd usually take the very first exit on the Virginia side then, for the George Washington Parkway instead of Route 1. (That end of the bridge also passes the grade school that I went to, and the adjacent cemetery where I now have several relatives and friends.)

Historian wrote: I can remember when the Beltway in Prince George's County was just two lanes in each direction and no one had to slow down before the Wilson Bridge, because there was not that much traffic! We were living in Landover, and it was before Landover Mall was built. Much of the land on either side of the Beltway from Route 202 to the bridge was full of tobacco or cornfields.

bflorhodes wrote: I've got a best memory. Sixteen years in D.C., and I've never crossed the Wilson Bridge.

Guess I'm going to miss all the fun.

MD wrote : I've only been on the Wilson Bridge once in my nearly 10 years in the area. It was about three months ago, and it took me two hours to go about six miles . . . and I had a screaming infant in the car who needed to eat, and I had no where to pull over. Worst afternoon of my life. Good riddance!

Driven wrote: I love the old bridge. I recommend that everyone find a time . . . when there is a bridge opening (check here: http://www.wilsonbridge.com/cms/cms-openings.htm ) and go through Old Town, south on Royal Road, then take a left out to the river bank. This is on the west bank just north of the bridge. Then wait. It is completely magical when the steady rumble of the bridge stops, and for a few minutes the rhythm of the river supersedes the normally dominant rhythm of the highway overhead.

I also love that the draw span is an open-steel grid. When you are on the deck, you can look down and see the water under the bridge through the leaves of the draw span. That's really cool. The new bridge has pavement on the deck. [The new span is much higher than the old, so there will be fewer draw span openings for vessels.]

P.S. I drive the bridge every workday, so I'm not immune to the traffic issues. I still love it.