Further festivity included the performance by a band, gunfire from ships, and a fireworks display.At the time of opening, the Brooklyn Bridge was not yet complete; the proposed public transit across the bridge was still being tested, while the Brooklyn approach was being completed.Patronage across the Brooklyn Bridge increased in the years after it opened; a million people paid to cross in the six first months. Brooklyn Bridge Park adjoins the Brooklyn Bridge, one of New York's best-known bridges, which connects Brooklyn to Manhattan.. The following year the vertical cables called “suspenders” were hung from the main cables to the temporary roadway below.Beginning in 1879 and over the following four years, work continued on completing the permanent roadway stretching out 135 feet above the water. In Manhattan, the pedestrian walkway is accessible from crosswalks at the intersection of the bridge and Centre Street, or through a staircase leading to Park Row.While the bridge has always permitted the passage of pedestrians, the promenade facilitates movement when other means of crossing the East River have become unavailable. To protect against the increased air pressure at that depth, the Manhattan caisson had 22 layers of timber on its roof, seven more than its Brooklyn counterpart had. Ultimately, the legislators passed a law authorizing the allotment with the condition that the cities would buy the stock of Brooklyn Bridge's private stockholders.Work proceeded concurrently on the anchorages on each side.The first temporary wire was stretched between the towers on August 15, 1876,By December 1876, a steel contract for the permanent cables still had not been awarded.The spinning of the wires required the manufacture of large coils of it which were galvanized but not oiled when they left the factory. It is the result of the study, of the experience, and of the knowledge of many men in many ages. The proposal for this bridge or for that matter any bridge across the East Rive was met with obvious indifference by the New York authorities but Roebling remained undeterred. Over the next several years Roebling continued to pursue his idea by exploiting his influential government connections. Ten more layers of timber were later added atop the ceiling, and the entire caisson was wrapped in tin and wood for further protection against flooding.
The bridge carried 8.5 million people in 1884, its first full year of operation; this number doubled to 17 million in 1885 and again to 34 million in 1889.By 1890, due to the popularity of the Brooklyn Bridge, there were proposals to construct other bridges across the East River between Manhattan and Though tolls had been instituted for carriages and cable-car customers since the bridge's opening, pedestrians were spared from the tolls originally.The first major upgrade to the Brooklyn Bridge commenced in 1948, when a contract for redesigning the bridge was awarded to While the rebuilding of the span was ongoing, a fallout shelter was constructed beneath the Manhattan approach in anticipation of the Simultaneous with the rebuilding of the Brooklyn Bridge, a double-decked viaduct for the BQE was being built through an existing steel overpass of the bridge's Brooklyn approach ramp.On the Manhattan side, the city approved a controversial rebuilding of the Manhattan entrance plaza in 1953. Even Washington Roebling himself was stricken with the bends from one of his ventures into the caisson in 1872. The thickness of the caisson's sides was 8 feet (2.4 m) at both the bottom and the top. At that time the tracks were removed and a six-lane highway and connecting ramps was installed, three lanes in each direction that today accommodates about 150,000 vehicles each and every day. In fact, fearing that even more workers in the caisson on the New York side of the river would be subjected to the bends, Roebling ordered a halt to the construction 30 feet short of the bedrock. There are two entrances to the bridge's Formerly, rail traffic operated on the Brooklyn Bridge as well. So severe was his illness that he was unable to return to the worksite but relied on his wife to act as his agent in overseeing the project. Proposals for a bridge connecting Manhattan and Brooklyn were first made in the early 19th century, which eventually led to the construction of the current span, designed by The Brooklyn Bridge is the southernmost of four toll-free vehicular bridges connecting Manhattan Island and The Brooklyn Bridge, the world's first major steel-wire To provide sufficient clearance for shipping in the East River, the Brooklyn Bridge incorporates long approach viaducts on either end to raise it from low ground on both shores.The main span between the two suspension towers is 1,595.5 feet (486.3 m) long and 85 feet (26 m) wide.The side spans, between each suspension tower and each side's suspension anchorages, are 930 feet (280 m) long.The main span and side spans are supported by a structure containing six An elevated pedestrian and cycling promenade runs in between the two roadways and 18 feet (5.5 m) above them.Each of the side spans is reached by an approach ramp.