great detail, including temporary installation of a "shoo-fly track" (bypass track) to allow the permanent railbed at the midline of the span to be rebuilt. The design/build phase of the bridge was assigned to the joint venture team of contractors White-Skanska-Conslgli under supervision by MassDOT. Preliminary design engineering was performed by Jacobs Engineering. STV, Inc. was the final design engineer and engineer of record. The design provided for widened sidewalks and bike lanes, with two motor vehicle lanes inbound (towards Boston), but only a single lane outbound (towards Cambridge). The Longfellow Bridge is considered to be the most important historic bridge in the City of Boston due to its prominent location over the Charles River and outstanding visual and architectural quality. The primary aim of the rehabilitation project was to address the bridge's structural deficiencies, upgrade its capacity and bring it up to date with modern codes while also preserving its visual and historic architectural character. A significant portion of the restoration work lay with dismantling, cleaning, restoring, and re-erecting the 58-foot-tall towers that frame the river's navigation channel, which had settled over time. The Longfellow Bridge Restoration and Rehabilitation project was scheduled for completion in 2016, but the completion date was extended to December 2018, due in part to historic restoration requiring obsolete construction techniques such as riveting. In August 2016, the outbound side of the bridge was completely closed to all traffic, including pedestrians and cyclists, in order to complete work sooner. This measure was undertaken to allow the bridge to be fully reopened by June 2018. After years of delays, the bridge was fully reopened on May 31, 2018, but portions of the project, such as replacing the pedestrian footbridge over Storrow Drive, were completed by the fall of 2018. According to Jonathan L. Gulliver, MassDOT Highway Administrator, the total cost of the rebuilding project was $306.6 million. After a settlement with its contractors, the state paid $305.5 million on a budgeted cost of $303.7 million, which had included cost overruns. See also List of bridges documented by the Historic American Engineering Record in Massachusetts References Further reading External links "The Bridge", poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Closures Restoration Longfellow Bridge project page Restoration of the Longfellow Bridge Bridges in Boston Bridges completed in 1793 Bridges completed in 1906 Buildings and structures in Cambridge, Massachusetts Historic American Engineering Record in Massachusetts Landmarks in Beacon Hill, Boston Landmarks