Lefty O'Doul Bridge

For other uses, see Third Street Bridge.

Lefty O'Doul Bridge
The bridge as seen from Oracle Park
Coordinates	37°46′36″N122°23′24″W / 37.77667°N 122.39000°W / 37.77667; -122.39000 (Lefty O'Doul Bridge)
Carries	Cars, bicycles, pedestrians
Crosses	Mission Creek
Locale	San Francisco, California
Named for	Lefty O'Doul
Characteristics
Design	Bascule bridge
No. of lanes	5
History
Designer	Joseph Strauss [1]
Construction cost	$640,000 [2]
Opened	May 12, 1933 [1]
Statistics
Toll	None
Location

The Lefty O'Doul Bridge (originally the Third Street Bridge and China Basin Bridge) is a bascule bridge connecting the China Basin and Mission Bay neighborhoods of San Francisco, carrying Third Street across the Mission Creek Channel. It is located directly adjacent to Oracle Park.

History

The bridge opened on May 12, 1933, at a ceremony attended by Mayor Angelo Joseph Rossi, having been designed by Joseph Strauss, chief engineer of the Golden Gate Bridge. ^[1] At the time, it carried pedestrians, automobiles, streetcars, and trains. ^[1] The bridge was renamed in 1980 in honor of baseball player Lefty O'Doul. ^{[3] [4]} It was retrofitted in 1999, prior to the opening of the adjacent ballpark, originally named Pacific Bell Park. ^[5]

Concrete counterweights for lifting the bridge

Usage

The bridge carries four lanes of car traffic and a bidirectional, class IV (on-street protected) bike lane. ^[6]

In popular culture

The bridge has been featured as a key location in three films: The third Dirty Harry film The Enforcer (1976), the James Bond movie A View to a Kill (1985) (where Bond drives a fire truck over the opened bridge), and San Andreas (2015). ^[7]

References

1. "Third Street Bridge Opens". The San Francisco Examiner . May 13, 1933. p. 3. Retrieved May 2, 2019– via newspapers.com.
2. "$640,000 Span Carries First Traffic". The San Francisco Examiner . May 13, 1933. p. 3. Retrieved May 2, 2019– via newspapers.com.
3. Salter, Stephanie (August 17, 1986). "O'Doul proves S.F. never too big for its bridges". The San Francisco Examiner . p. B-1. Retrieved May 2, 2019– via newspapers.com.
4. Salter, Stephanie (August 17, 1986). "O'Doul proves S.F. never too big for its bridges (cont'd)". The San Francisco Examiner . p. B-2. Retrieved May 2, 2019– via newspapers.com.
5. Delgado, Ray (July 13, 1999). "Third Street drawbridge to be closed 15 weeks". The San Francisco Examiner . p. A-7. Retrieved May 2, 2019– via newspapers.com.
6. "Third Street Bridge Bikeway Connection | SFMTA". www.sfmta.com. Retrieved August 30, 2025.
7. Nolte, Carl (December 31, 2017). "What's up with Lefty O'Doul Bridge? It's locked for repairs, reaching skyward during closure". The San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on January 1, 2018. Retrieved November 9, 2024.

Further reading

• "3rd St Bridge Then and Now". foundsf.org.
• "San Francisco Landmark #194: Third Street Bridge". noehill.com.