mook Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> OK, you got me searching. Short of some of the
> semi-official books that I don't have, Wikipedia
> [en.wikipedia.org]
> 3Oakland_Bay_Bridge#Modification_for_improved_traf
> fic_flow_.281960.29 is a little unclear, but seems
> to suggest that while double-deck operation (5
> lanes each way) started in 1960 the upper deck
> wasn't lowered until 1963. Something doesn't seem
> right about that timing. Frankly, though, I don't
> remember crossing it before double-deck operation
> started, but probably did on family vacation trips
> and the like.

Here is a story about the "HUMP" on the Bay Bridge, especially suited for my good friend MOOK:
The last time the state made major alterations to the Bay Bridge, the project produced the biggest traffic mess in the bridge's history -- and the seismic work now on the drawing boards will be even more complicated.
Nearly 35 years ago, state engineers started converting the lower deck for use by cars, a $50 million project that featured a movable traffic ramp called the "Hump." The bridge was kept open during the work, which was an engineer's dream but a commuter's nightmare.
Over the course of two years, there were hundreds of accidents, thousands of delays and at least one traffic death. Things got so bad that Governor Edmund G. Brown Sr. took time out on Christmas Day 1961 to demand that his highway agency immediately investigate the project.
But that project was nothing compared to what the state has in mind now: replacing the eastbound approaches to the bridge, rebuilding or replacing the Yerba Buena-to-Oakland section and doing extensive work on the suspension spans.

"They are going to have a horrendous problem," said Robert Halligan, a retired Caltrans spokesman who worked for the state Public Works Department during the earlier project.
There are differences: In 1961, the bridge carried 110,000 vehicles a day. Now it carries 250,000. The repairs this time will cost $1 billion or more. And while Caltrans engineers insist that they can keep traffic disruptions to a minimum, the work is expected to take at least four years.
The last time, it all began when engineers concluded that Bay Bridge traffic patterns had to be redesigned. When it opened in 1936, the bridge was designed to carry 60,000 cars a day. Automobiles used the upper deck, going east and west. The lower deck had two rail tracks for interurban trains and three lanes for trucks.
The bridge trains stopped running in 1958. Not long afterward, the state Division of Bay Toll Crossings came up with a plan to remove the tracks and convert the bridge into a 10-lane freeway, with eastbound traffic on the lower deck and westbound on the upper.
It was all fairly straightforward, except that the upper deck had to be lowered 16 inches inside the Yerba Buena Island tunnel so trucks could use it safely. The work had to be done while traffic moved around it -- even during rush hour. It was a bit like open- heart surgery.

The contractor was Charles L. Harney, Inc., fresh from building San Francisco's newest landmark, Candlestick Park.
The key was six parallel, 26- foot-long temporary movable bridges, or ramps, inside the tunnel. The movable ramps connected the old and new roadway. Cars had to slow to 15 miles per hour to go over the ramp, which was 16 inches high.
The state put up signs warning of what was ahead. One of them, a big yellow sign that said "HUMP", was stolen almost immediately.
"The word has other meanings," Halligan said dryly. But the sign gave the project its name.
The Hump opened for business at 6 a.m. on Nov. 25, 1961. The first accident happened at 6:12.
"It's only the beginning," California Highway Patrol Captain George Tobin said at the time.
It was the beginning of a bad dream. Cars were bigger then and some had tail fins. Hitting the Hump at high speed sent the monster cars of the day out of control. Some lighter foreign cars actually became airborne. One CHP officer said he was worried about midair collisions.
There were no midair collisions, but traffic got worse and worse. The state said not to worry. It was all for progress, and progress had its price.

But Governor Brown was a notorious worrier, and by Christmas, he was really worried. He demanded an investigation into reports that the contractor and the state public works people were operating with "a public-be-damned attitude."
Nothing came of that. The Harney people got a clean bill of health. "It's the toughest job any man ever worked at," said Norman Raab, the state engineer in charge.
The public was urged to be patient. By January, speed over the Hump was increased to 25 miles per hour, but then work was delayed by a strike that lasted nearly two months.
The newspapers said the public was furious over the work and the delays, but Raab insisted everything was fine. The newspapers, he said, "should be ashamed of themselves."
Work resumed on July 3 -- producing another traffic jam that very day. Then The Chronicle began an investigation that concluded that the state could have done the job without the Hump and without traffic problems.
Raab strongly denied the allegations, and nearly 35 years later, Halligan still thinks the engineer was right. "It worked well," he said of the Hump. "It was the only way to do the job." Still, Halligan points out today, the new project will cause similar problems. "We were facing the same situation they'll face with the earthquake retrofit job," he says.
The Hump was finally dismantled on Oct. 27, 1962, and the rest of the project finished the next year. But the Hump made it clear the Bay Bridge alone could not do the job. A week after the Hump was taken down, Bay Area voters approved a bond issue for a new Bay Area Rapid Transit District.
On the Hump's last day, The Chronicle ran its epitaph: "It produced more jams than Grandma ever made."

KRK