New Innovative Features of Maine's First Cable Stay Bridge

The steel suspension Waldo-Hancock Bridge carried U.S. Route 1 travelers over the Penobscot River, near the town of Bucksport, Maine for 74 years. This vitally important transportation link provided safe passage for carloads of tourists through the years, in addition to significant commercial traffic related to regional paper-making, granite-quarrying, boat building, manufactured housing production and a host of freight items, such as delivery of home heating oil. In 2002, a scheduled renovation began and in the summer of 2003, the main suspension cables were unwrapped to prepare for a visual inspection of the individual wires in the 37 cables in each main cable. Deterioration of the main cable on the south side of the bridge was much more advanced than expected, leading the bridge owner, Maine Department of Transportation, to simultaneously undertake a strengthening project on the Waldo-Hancock Bridge and the design of the Penobscot Narrows Bridge & Observatory on a parallel alignment to the existing bridge.