Victory Bridge (New Jersey)

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The Victory Bridge is a highway bridge that carries Route 35 over the Raritan River, connecting the Middlesex County, New Jersey communities of Perth Amboy on the north and Sayreville to the south. The bridge is operated and maintained by the New Jersey Department of Transportation (NJDOT).

The new bridge consists of twin structures (northbound and southbound) each carrying two 12-foot travel lanes, a 10-foot bike lane / outside shoulder and a three-foot shoulder. The southbound bridge also has a six-foot wide sidewalk. The bridge was designed with a record-setting 134-meter (440-foot) main span-the longest precast cantilever segmental construction in the United States. To reduce the construction time, the NJDOT selected the segmental precast concrete construction method for both the superstructure and substructure. The department estimated that by using this type of approach, it would reduce the duration of construction by at least one year and save millions of dollars in life cycle costs.

Construction on the first half of the new high level fixed bridge across the Raritan River was completed on June 8, 2004. The old Victory Bridge was then demolished and the new northbound parallel bridge was constructed in its place. The new, northbound section of the bridge opened to traffic on September 2, 2005. The new high-level fixed bridge eliminates traffic delays caused when opening the former low-level swing bridge to allow boat traffic to pass through.

On May 3, 2006, the new bridge claimed its first suicide victim. A man (whose name is as of yet unknown) murdered his estranged wife, 36-year-old Donna Palladino of Barnegat Township, and her 65-year-old mother Mary Jane Beckmann in South Amboy. The man then leaped off the southbound span on the Perth Amboy side of the bridge to his death but missed the water and landed in the Hess oil facility.^[1]