Daring 2B Different: Unique Benicia-Martinez Bridge Meets Difficult Challenges to be This Year's No. 1 Bridge

This article highlights the journal?s selection of the top ten bridges of 2006, with the Benicia-Martinez Bridge in the San Francisco Bay Area in California taking top honors. The Benicia-Martinez Bridge, which cost $800 million and uses a cast-in-place balanced cantilever, is 1.4 miles in length, and carries I-680 over the bay. The bridge is critical for the Bay Area as it is one of the main arterials connecting the region with Sacramento. Lightweight concrete was used for the bridge?s superstructure, along with post tensioning and midspan hinges to make the bridge more seismically robust in this earthquake-prone region. A brief overview is given of the other bridge in the top ten list. These include: the Lime Kiln Bridge in Colchester/South Burlington, Vermont; the Bass River Bridge in New Jersey; the Hickory Street Bridge in Warren, Pennsylvania; the Sanibel Island Causeway in Fort Myers Florida; the I-355 Extension Bridge in Lemont, Illinois; the Monroe Street Viaduct in Baltimore, Maryland; the Perry Street Bridge in Napoleon, Ohio; the J.T. Butler Boulevard in Jacksonville, Florida, and the Fremont Bridge in Seattle, Washington.