Pattullo Bridge (Surrey, British Columbia)

Canada / British Columbia / White Rock / Surrey, British Columbia
A four lane bridge for automotive traffic. The lanes are very narrow, and there is no divider. It was built in the 1930's to hold only 3 lanes of traffic.

NOTE: pronounced PAH-TOOL-OH, NOT PAH-TULL-OH, which is a common mis pronunciation.

Pattullo Bridge is a compression arch suspended-deck bridge located in the Greater Vancouver Regional District of British Columbia, Canada. Constructed in 1935, it spans the Fraser River and links the city of New Westminster on the north bank of the river to the city of Surrey on the south bank. The bridge forms part of Routes 1A and 99A.

The Pattullo Bridge consists of four lanes (two in each direction) with no barrier of any sort in the centre, making it highly prone to head-on collisions, especially at excessive speed or bad weather. The province and Translink have since closed the middle lanes to traffic from 10:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. in an effort to lower the high number of fatal head-on collisions that occur, and installed a series of plastic pillars to raise visibility of the centre lane divider. On January 2, 2006, four people were killed in a T-bone collision between two cars on the southern approach lane.

In response to the high number of crashes that take place on the bridge, Translink is studying the idea of reducing the number of lanes on the bridge from four to three utilizing a counterflow operation. This arrangement is similar to what is being used on the Lions Gate Bridge with the number of lanes being varied depending on traffic flow and volume. A second key and more controversial proposal, is to install photo radar on the bridge to enforce the existing speed limit. Thus far, the provincial government have ruled out the idea of photo radar being brought back.

Its appearance of dark orange colour and arch shape highly resembles the Port Mann Bridge, located just a few kilometers upstream. The bridge was named for Thomas Dufferin Pattullo, former premier of British Columbia.
Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattullo_Bridge
Nearby cities:
Coordinates:   49°12'26"N   122°53'28"W

Comments

  • If crossing this bridge do stay in your own lane as many people have lost there lives here because either they didn't or somebody else didn't.
  • This bridge sucks and is falling apart. I hope they replace it. I heard they might build a new bridge over the sapperton sand bar to the east, and build a port terminal on an artificial island there.
  • they will not build a new bridge, but they will do a large scale repair (practically building another one) on he current one, replacing the foundations, re-welding, re-bolting and everything. they do plan to later in 10-20 years. personally i like the bridge, It may be narrow, but its the drivers faults for crashing. in fact, most roads are narrower in Europe. It looks nice to me, especially the old style arch shape and vibrant colours. They will replace the bridge, but the replacement planned has the arch shape as a tribute to the most noticeable bridge around new west.
This article was last modified 15 years ago