City Bridge Report:

More than half of Queens 190 bridges are not functioning as designed and require extensive rehabilitation, it was learned by The Queens Courier from a just-released city Transportation Department (DOT) annual bridge report.
Covering the boroughs 17 bridge zones, DOTs bridge Annual Condition Report listed one bridge as "poor," and another 109 as "fair." However, the reports "fair" designations actually describes various levels of structural deterioration which showed that the bridges were "not functioning as originally designed."
The 2002 report also listed the remaining 80 Queens spans as "good" or "very good" a 10% improvement of bridge services over the previous year.
Each of the citys 736 bridges is inspected every two years by city and state inspectors, as mandated by federal law. The inspections must evaluate the effect of daily pounding the bridges take from traffic on the boroughs more than 90 arterial highway bridges, over 80 city street spans, on 16 waterway crossings, as well as on 12 pedestrian bridges.
As a result of negative reports 12 years ago, a 10-year, $3.5 billion bridge reconstruction program was launched in 1995, and is scheduled to be completed next year.
During the past year, major repair and rehabilitation progress on 30 local borough bridges was reported by the city DOT. Repairs were completed on the 93-year-old Queens Boulevard Bridge, over the LIRR/AMTRAK yards in Long Island City, whose roadways link Queens Boulevard rush hour volumes to and from the adjacent Queensboro Bridge. The busy crossing carries more than 176,000 cars and trucks between Queens and Manhattan every day on its twin, reversible levels.
Earlier this year, the nearby Honeywell Street Bridge, which had been closed since 1979, was finally reopened as an alternate route to and from the commercial and industrial sections of Long Island City. For nearly a quarter century, cars and trucks headed for this busy area faced congested side streets because of its closure.
Queens BP Helen Marshall said that she was pleased with the reports of traffic improvement that accompanied the reconstruction of the Queens Boulevard and Honeywell Street Bridges, but was concerned about the need to expand the bridge rehabilitative program in Queens. Marshall and DOT Commissioner Iris Weinshall had met earlier this month to discuss the status of DOTs bridge repair program.
With more than one-quarter of the citys 736 bridges, including 12 pedestrian crossings, Queens has New York Citys largest concentration of bridges. The borough also contains the citys largest street and highway systems. As a result, Queens motorists and residents have become the most vulnerable to the citys traffic problems whenever a bridge or a highway lane is even partially closed for repairs.