The Washington Bridge carries six lanes of traffic, as well as sidewalks on both sides, over the Harlem River in New York City between the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx, connecting 181st Street and Amsterdam Avenue in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan to University Avenue in the Morris Heights neighborhood of the Bronx. Ramps at either end of the bridge connect to the Trans-Manhattan Expressway and the Cross-Bronx Expressway. The bridge is operated and maintained by the New York City Department of Transportation. It once carried U.S. Route 1, which now travels over the Alexander Hamilton Bridge.The total length of the bridge, including approaches, is 2375ft. The parallel main spans of the steel arch bridge stretch 510ft over the Harlem River, providing 134ft of vertical clearance and 354ft of horizontal clearance. The tidal maximum (mean higher high water) is 4.9ft and extreme low water is -3.5 compared to mean lower low water.This two-hinged arch bridge was designed by Charles C. Schneider and Wilhelm Hildenbrand, with modifications to the design made by the Union Bridge Company, William J. McAlpine, Theodore Cooper and DeLemos & Cordes, with Edward H. Kendall as consulting architect. The original design was pared down to bring the bridge's cost to $3 million. The bridge features steel-arch construction with two 510-foot-long (150m) main spans and masonry approaches. Construction began in 1886, and the bridge opened to pedestrian traffic on December 1, 1888. The plan had been to open the bridge to vehicular traffic on February 22, 1889 — Washington's Birthday and the centennial anniversary of the first Presidency — but the full opening was delayed until December 1889.
