Bridge design chosen

The Arcadia City Council voted Tuesday evening on their preferred bridge design for the Gold Line bridge to be built over Santa Anita Avenue which is to be built in time for the opening of the light rail line from Pasadena to Asuza by 2013.

The Council opted for a retro design that features straight vertical walls on both ends and horizontal and vertical lines, as seen in designs at right.

The  concrete bridge will go above Santa Anita Avenue where the current railroad tracks create a slight rise in the road near Fasching’s Car Wash and Goldstein’s bakery. It will be 172-feet wide and will lead to 30-foot-tall walls on each side of the tracks east of Santa Anita Avenue as the double tracks descend to a street level crossing at First Avenue.

A multi-level parking garage — two stories initially with the capacity to extend to four levels eventually — will be built across from 24 Hour Fitness on the northwest corner of First Avenue and Santa Clara Avenue, with a landscaped “transit plaza” potentially featuring public art in a triangle area between the tracks, street and garage.

The train station platforms will be built a few hundred feet down the tracks east of First Avenue on the southeast corner of the intersection.

Another bridge will be built over the eastbound lanes of the Interstate 210 freeway, and the bridges over Colorado Blvd. and Second Avenue will need to be expanded to accommodate two sets of tracks instead of one.

— By Scott Hettrick