A complex of three separate bridges Spanning the Harlem River, the Bronx Kill, and the Hell Gate (part of the East River). The bridges connect the boroughs of Manhattan, Queens, and the Bronx via Randall's Island and Ward's Island, which are joined by a landfill. The American Society of Civil Engineers designated the Triborough Bridge Project as a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark in 1986. Construction on the Triborough project had begun on Black Friday in 1929, and its outlook began to look bleak. Othmar Ammann's assistance was enlisted to help simplify the structure. Ammann collapsed the original two-deck roadway into one, allowing for lighter towers, and, thus, lighter piers. These cost-saving revisions saved $10 million on the towers alone. Using New Deal money, the project was resurrected in the early 1930s by Robert Moses, and the bridge was opened to traffic on July 11, 1936.
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