Yolo County, California Bridges: I-80 Bridges over Yolo Bypass

July 2013 (38.57056 Degrees, -121.59722 Degrees) I-80 Yolo Causeway

Continuing west on what  is now Interstate 80 we enter the Yolo Bypass (that was previously discussed when we visited the I-5 Bypass Bridge). This large basin fills with water during the winter and prevents flooding of East and West Sacramento. We can see where I-5 and I-80 cross the Bypass in the figure below.

The Yolo Causeway is actually two long viaducts (Yolo Causeway East (22 0045) and Yolo Causeway West (22 0044)) with a short embankment between them. The East Causeway is a 220 span prestressed concrete T girder bridge and the West Causeway is a 72 span prestressed concrete T girder bridge. These bridges were built in 1962.

The Causeway was retrofitted in 1997 with fiber reinforced polymer collars at the connection between the shafts and the shaft extensions. This should allow them to form strong pins during an earthquake that will prevent the connections from breaking. Also, every fifth bent cap had an extension built on the end to connect it to a large diameter shaft. During an earthquake these shafts will prevent the causeway from undergoing large displacements.

Similar to I-5 Bypass Bridge to the north, the I-80 Causeway also has a parallel railroad viaduct. However, these tracks carry Amtrak and Union Pacific freight trains and are in constant use.

Yolo County, California Bridges: I-80 Bridges over Yolo Bypass by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.