Shoemaker Bridge(Long Beach, CA)

[Plutonic Panda]

This bridge is slated to be replaced with approaches completely rebuilt and redesigned to allow for an expanded park near Downtown Long Beach.

Long Beach officials revealed updated plans Saturday for a new $900 million bridge that is slated to replace the aging Shoemaker Bridge and add 5.6 acres of park space to Downtown, something the city hopes to complete by 2028.

The new renderings show a modern cable-stayed bridge with 240-foot tall angled arches that meet in the middle of the 765-foot-wide bridge. Building the new structure is part of a plan to realign Shoreline Drive, which would significantly change how drivers enter and exit the 710 Freeway in Downtown.

- https://lbpost.com/news/new-shoemaker-bridge-downtown-710-rendering-arches-roundabout/

[Plutonic Panda]

It appears the existing road shown in the rendering will be removed to expand the existing park. If anything I think they should kept the road on its current alignment and narrowed it and added some pedestrian bridges or underpasses like Central Park in NYC has. This would allow the park to interact with the waterfront better.

[DTComposer]

It appears the existing road shown in the rendering will be removed to expand the existing park. If anything I think they should kept the road on its current alignment and narrowed it and added some pedestrian bridges or underpasses like Central Park in NYC has. This would allow the park to interact with the waterfront better.

That road (on the left of the rendering) is just the northbound lanes - the new two-way road from the roundabout is going over the current southbound lanes.

I agree, though - in all the renderings I've seen over the years, they've ignored the riverfront (which does have a bike trail along it). I would send the two-way road on the current northbound lanes, depress it enough so there could be a series of ped/bike bridges over it, and really create a connection between downtown and the river - and perhaps be part of an expanded riverfront park that could go south to meet Shoreline Aquatic Park - take over the RV park, consolidate the parking at the CSU headquarters, and restore those to the wetlands that already exist just south of the RV park.

In a larger regional context, this could be a crown jewel in the efforts to return the L.A. River to a more natural state.

[Max Rockatansky]

I always thought it was odd this structure never was annexed into the state highway system.  I hit on the history of the span a couple months back on Gribblenation:

https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=775638511234674&set=a.506754794789715

The post text reads:

"Featured is an aerial photo of the Long Beach owned segment of the Long Beach Freeway from the March/April 1961 California Highways & Public Works. By 1959 the city of Long Beach completed their own segment of the Long Beach Freeway from US Route 101A (Pacific Coast Highway) south to Broadway (and may have been signed as California State Route 15). During December 1984 both AASHTO and the FHWA would approve Interstate 710 being extended south from California State Route 1 (Pacific Coast Highway) to Ocean Boulevard. Earlier during 1984 Legislative Chapter 409 transferred California State Route 7 to the newly designated "Route 710." The newly created Route 710 included the portion of the Long Beach Freeway then owned by Long Beach from California State Route 1 to Ocean Boulevard."

[Occidental Tourist]

From the photo, it appears that they are already working on the extension to Harbor Scenic Drive.  Even though the Shoreline portion would be signed as CA-7 after that (for a couple of decades), maybe back then they knew there were plans at some point in the future to move the highway routing to the western bank of the river south of the Shoemaker Bridge.

[pderocco]

Am I the only one who thinks that's one staggeringly ugly bridge? I hate bridges that are gussied up with huge structures that aren't actually needed to carry the weight. This one looks like the road will be holding up the oversized arches on a lot of skinny poles, not the other way around. Some egotistical architect trying to show off how different he can be...

[Max Rockatansky]

I think the design is hideous.

[Plutonic Panda]

I'm curious if that'll be solid concrete or if it'll be hollow. The more I look at it the more I don't like it but at first glance it's look okay. Just as someone else said it seems more form over function.

[Occidental Tourist]

It's ugly and all of the suspension "ironwork" is unnecessary.  I wonder how much the $900 million price tag would drop if they built a standard box girder bridge.