A decade after Flatiron and joint venture partners began work on the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge Skyway, Flatiron crews connected the bridge to Oakland’s shore and opened the bridge to traffic.

Flatiron’s first work on the new Bay Bridge on the more than $1 billion Skyway project was completed in 2008. The contract was one of 20 awarded to replace the entire eastern span of the bridge connecting Oakland with Yerba Buena Island. The Oakland Touchdown project included construction of the last 450 feet of cast-in-place, post-tensioned, box girder bridge that connected the new eastern span of the bridge to Oakland. Flatiron was also responsible for a mile of approach roadway and building an access trestle, in addition to the traffic switch operation.

The new bridge, constructed with a 100-year design life and special signature architectural details, is actually two parallel bridges with 10 lanes of traffic and four full-width shoulders. As one of the nation’s busiest bridges, it is used by up to 280,000 vehicles daily. The bridge and the Oakland Touchdown are both built with high-strength concrete and equipped with electrical service and seismic monitoring systems.

The project was built on price and schedule, which allowed crews only 140 days to build the touchdown. The final piece of the project involved 72 hours of continuous work to open the bridge to the public.