The project’s tower cranes are essential to the main span’s progress.
While the project’s I Lift NY super crane continues to raise large sections of structural steel on the main span roadway, four lighter and taller cranes have proved to be the real workhorses on the cable-stayed structure. These red tower cranes are vital to the day-to-day operations on the main span, moving essential materials and equipment with precision.
These days they are raising the bridge’s stay cables into position, allowing the main span roadway to grow closer to completion.
The tower cranes have stood between the iconic 419-foot towers since the fall of 2015, providing assistance to carpenters, ironworkers and other work teams on the main span. The machines delivered everything from buckets of newly mixed concrete to preassembled cages of galvanized rebar when the eight towers were being constructed. The extendable cranes rose along with the main span towers, with their cabins reaching their highest point at 490 feet above the Hudson River, making them the tallest facet of the project.
Although other cranes on the project have greater lifting capacities, the tower cranes are uniquely capable of reaching the highest points on the main span. This key ability allowed the cranes to remove the blue jump forms – the mobile workspaces that helped shape the towers.
A group of highly-trained experts work in pairs to operate the tower cranes. Each shift of experienced operators is in constant communication with one another and their supervisors at ground level to hoist up to 25 tons of material at a time. These operators arrive on the project site before most other teams, giving them time to climb to the crane’s operating cabins with the assistance of safety tethers.
”It’s a long climb,“ says Operating Engineer Mike Monahan. “But it’s worth it when you reach the top. I’m usually up there in time to see the sunrise.”
Both Monahan and fellow operator John Slegona have controlled a variety of machines on the New NY Bridge project since 2013, each assisting with foundation efforts and material testing operations.
“We’re proud of be a part of history in the making,” Slegona says. “It’ll be exciting to finally drive over the bridge and take in what we’ve accomplished.”
The tower cranes will continue to assist with main span operations including the installation of permanent maintenance elevators. Click to learn more about the latest progress on the main span and other operating engineers on the project.
