Gold Line Bridge Shows Off Its "Sensuous" Finished Form

We've been talking for years now about the Gold Line light rail extension's eye-catching basket bridge over the 210, the first piece of the train's puzzle, and now it's finally done. While trains won't run from Pasadena to Azusa until 2015, the bridge marks the first major piece of infrastructure completed for the 11.5-mile extension, The Source reports. Finished on time and within budget, the bridge was built by SKANSKA, designed by AECOM, and conceived by Andrew Leicester. The bridge's distinctive baskets represent the Native Americans who once traveled along this stretch of Arcadia. At a media preview today, Leicester described the bridge as a "sensuous, curvilinear structure." Later he joked that he was initially given "carte blanche" for his bridge designs and had planned "towers over 100 feet tall, solar panels, wind turbines, things fluttering in the wind," and "water spraying on stuff. But it slowly distilled down to one material which had to be maintenance-free and rigid and unmoving."
· Gold Line Foothill Extension Bridge is complete! [The Source]