Wednesday, November 3, 2010

The Zipper


Do you know what this big, blue vehicle is? 

If you're familiar with Coronado you've seen it plenty of times.  It's one of two "zippers" which move the Coronado Bridge's median divider twice a day to accommodate the surge of traffic coming on the island in the morning, and leaving in the afternoon.  The two vehicles move the divider segments piece by piece, much like zippers on clothing. It's a clever solution that allows this five lane bridge to swap the center lane to either side as needed.

Brilliant!

3 comments:

  1. Would be interesting to see the zippers in action.

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  2. It's a pretty ingenious machine, and fun to watch. Because it moves a heavy barrier it has to go quite slowly. The kids wave at the drivers as they pass.

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  3. It is a great idea and much better than what they do here, which is to change the middle lane color from red to green. It's amazing that there aren't more head on crashes! On one of the main roads-22 highway- a zipper is used to expand and contract the lanes. It's not always effective. I think it was removed, now that I think about it. Still, it always reminded me of the Coronado Bay Bridge.

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