Tobin to become state's first 'smart' bridge

(John Tlumacki/Globe Staff)

By Globe Staff

The Tobin Bridge will be outfitted with wireless sensors that will provide information about stresses and loads on the bridge, making it the first "smart" bridge in the state, Massport officials said today.

Thomas Kinton, executive director of the Massachusetts Port Authority, said the system would add to the current schedule of two- and four-year bridge inspections.

"This new smart bridge technology will supplement those inspections and take our stewardship of the bridge to the next level," he said in a statement.

Joe Staub, deputy director of the bridge, said the system had the "potential to be an early detection system enabling us to address conditions as they develop and before they become potential problems."

Some 80,000 motorists use the 2.25-mile-long bridge every day. The bridge, a major artery connecting Boston to the North Shore, opened in 1950, the authority said.

Last summer, shards of rusty metal and chunks of concrete rained down from the bridge onto the yacht club below, prompting Massport to accelerate inspections.

In October, inspectors found fissures in a floor beam of the bridge that required highway officials to ban trucks, buses, and other commercial vehicles from the southbound lanes.

Officials said then that they are constantly maintaining the bridge and the cost is expected to rise as time attacks the 15 concrete piers and 92 steel columns that support the mammoth structure.

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