“And, certainly not in the timeframe we were given,” he adds. The bridge was closed in early July 2007, and was slated to reopen to traffic by the end of August. To make matters more difficult, the work on Nationals Park was taking place in the same small area as the bridge project.

Further complicating matters was working alongside the Nationals Park crews. South Capital Street runs directly alongside the stadium, making it difficult for both projects to stay out of each other’s way. “Our limit of disturbance was their limit of disturbance, basically,” Cox says. “The end of the stadium, the sidewalk was right up against the street we were building.”

There were frequent conflicts of interest between the two projects, Cox says, and they were solved by working with the stadium project’s contractors to schedule access to the street. “We had to figure out a way in the field to coordinate this, because what we didn’t want was for it to rise up between us as contractors,” Cox says.

With cooperation in mind, he adds, both sides amicably settled conflicts in their schedules and prevent new ones from springing up. “I think both sides had the same goals in mind,” Cox says. “It was a recognition by both sides that we had goals that we had to meet and neither one of us would be successful if the other one was not.”

To meet the challenge of lowering the bridge to grade, Cox says, Corman relied on subcontractor Barnhart Crane and Rigging Co. from Alabama to supply it with 12-foot hydraulic jacks. “That definitely was, from a technological and engineering standpoint, the hardest part of the job,” Cox says.

Ammann & Whitney Consulting of Richmond, Va., performed the engineering work for the lowering of the bridge, and Project Manager Adam Matteo says its unique structure required careful planning.

“The biggest concern was the curvature of the bridge segments that we were lowering,” he says. If the weight hadn’t been spaced evenly, he continues, the segments would have begun moving from side to side. “If you have those kinds of angles, it wants to slide a bit.”

Matteo says the problem was solved by using the 12-foot jacks, which allowed for longer movements without stopping to reset, and a series of clamps and braces to prohibit massive movements. A backup cable was used to maintain tension, he adds. “We’ve done some really unusual things, but I would put this right up near the top,” Matteo says. He adds that the Washington, D.C., Department of Transportation should be commended for having the vision to try such a bold project.