The Walt Whitman Bridge is a green-colored single-level suspension bridge spanning the Delaware River from Philadelphia to Gloucester City, New Jersey. Named after the poet Walt Whitman, who resided in nearby Camden toward the end of his life, the Walt Whitman Bridge is one of the larger bridges on the east coast of the United States. The bridge is owned and operated by the Delaware River Port Authority.
Construction on the bridge began in 1953, and it opened to traffic on May 16, 1957. The bridge has a total length of 11,981 feet (3,652 m), and a main span of 610 metres (2,000 ft). The bridge has seven lanes, three in each direction and a center lane that is shifted variably (via a zipper barrier) to accommodate heavy traffic.
The bridge is a part of Interstate 76 (at milepost 351.98) (which, between the river and the Pennsylvania Turnpike interchange in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, is known as the "Schuylkill Expressway"). Along with the Benjamin Franklin Bridge, Betsy Ross Bridge, Delaware Memorial Bridge, and Commodore Barry Bridge, the Walt Whitman Bridge is one of five expressway-standard bridges connecting the Philadelphia area with southern New Jersey.
The bridge was designed by noted civil engineer Othmar Ammann.
Read more about Walt Whitman Bridge: Tolls
Famous quotes containing the words walt whitman, walt, whitman and/or bridge:
“O western orb sailing the heaven,
Now I know what you must have meant as a month since I walked,
As I walked in silence the transparent shadowy night,”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
“In the middle of the next century, when the literary establishment will reflect the multicultural makeup of this country and not be dominated by assimiliationists with similar tastes, from similar backgrounds, and of similar pretensions, Langston Hughes will be to the twentieth century what Walt Whitman was to the nineteenth.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)
“Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles! blow!
Through the windows—through doors—burst like a ruthless force,
Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation;
Into the school where the scholar is studying;
Leave not the bridegroom quiet—no happiness must he have now with his bride;
Nor the peaceful farmer any peace, plough his field or gathering his
grain;
So fierce you whirr and pound, you drums—so shrill you bugles blow.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
“Poetry is not only dream and vision; it is the skeleton architecture of our lives. It lays the foundations for a future of change, a bridge across our fears of what has never been before.”
—Audre Lorde (1934–1992)