Leonard P. Zakim Bunker Hill Memorial Bridge, Cable-stayed bridge in Boston, United States.
The Leonard P. Zakim Bunker Hill Memorial Bridge is a cable-stayed bridge carrying ten lanes of Interstate 93 and U.S. Route 1 across the Charles River in Boston. Its two 98.4-meter reinforced-concrete pylons have a lambda shape and obelisk-shaped tops echoing the Bunker Hill Monument. White cables fan from the pylons to the steel deck, which has a main span of 227 meters and a total length of 430 meters between expansion joints.
The crossing opened in 2003 as part of the Big Dig, the largest urban construction project in American history. It replaced the Charlestown High Bridge from the 1950s and was named after a civil rights activist and the battle that took place nearby in the 18th century.
The structure connects Charlestown with downtown and has become a landmark that appears on postcards and in films. For locals and travelers alike, it marks the moment when you arrive in or depart from Boston, serving as a reference point across the cityscape.
The deck carries ten lanes: eight on the main span of I-93 and two cantilevered outside the cables for traffic from the Sumner Tunnel and North End ramp. Pedestrians and cyclists cross the Charles nearby on the North Bank Bridge, a link in the Charles River Bike Path, reaching North Point Park in Cambridge. The landscaped area beneath the deck, with the Five Beacons for the Lost Half Mile artworks, is publicly accessible.
Each pylon top is shaped like an obelisk, echoing the nearby Bunker Hill Monument, and the cables pass through cradles in the towers in a harp configuration. The bridge is 56 m wide with ten lanes, making it one of the widest cable-stayed bridges in the world. Beneath the deck, the landscape by Carol R. Johnson Associates holds perforated stainless steel light artworks titled Five Beacons for the Lost Half Mile.
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