1936: The Inauguration of the Triborough Bridge in New York City

July 11, 1936

New York City’s Triborough Bridge — connecting the boroughs of Manhattan, Queens, and the Bronx — was officially opened to traffic. The structure crosses the East and Harlem Rivers as well as the Bronx Kill strait. This bridge is actually a complex encompassing three long-span bridges, a web of viaducts and smaller bridges, and approach highways and parkways. 

Edward A. Byrne, who was a longtime chief engineer of New York City’s Department of Plant and Structures, first announced plans for what became the Triborough Bridge in 1916. Construction on that infrastructure began in 1929.  More than 15,000 invited guests were on hand for the Triborough Bridge’s opening, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt was among those who spoke at the ceremony. 

 “This Triborough Bridge was neither in its conception nor in its building a matter of purely local concern,” he said to those in attendance. “Nation, State and city, each in its own way, have contributed to the gigantic undertaking. And it will serve the people not only in all the boroughs of this largest of cities; it will serve also the people of Long Island, of up-state New York and our neighbors of Connecticut and New Jersey; and it will serve the hundreds of thousands of those living in all the other States and in in foreign countries, who visit New York on matters of business and pleasure.” 

Other dignitaries in attendance include the New York City Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia, mayor of New York City; Herbert H. Lehman, the Empire State’s governor; and Harold L. Ickes, U.S. secretary of the interior. Along with addressing the crowd that day, Roosevelt rode in the automobile leading a vehicular parade over the Harlem River lift span portion of the newly opened complex. 

In 2008, the Triborough Bridge was formally renamed the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge in honor of that one-time U.S. senator from New York. (The above photo of the Queens span portion of the bridge was taken in 2013.)

Photo Credit: Metropolitan Transportation Authority (https://www.flickr.com/people/61135621@N03) – licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en   

For more information on the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge (originally called the Triborough Bridge), please check out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_F._Kennedy_Bridge