I’ve been a bridgetender since 2001, and I love my job. In particular, I love operating the drawbridge that I work on right now: the University Bridge in Seattle, Washington. I’m quite good at what I do. Every member of the traveling public has been safe on my watch, and that’s as it should be. It’s the only acceptable way it can be, because that’s the whole point of it.
I know every accessible inch of this bridge. I know its quirks. I know how it behaves when it gets too hot or too cold. If something is off with the engines, quite often I can feel it in the soles of my feet.
While I do object when people call inanimate objects that bend to one’s will “she”, I do love this bridge as if it were alive. I take pride in maintaining it to the best of my ability, and if something goes wrong that’s beyond my ability (which is often the case), I do my best to write thorough reports so the electricians or mechanics are fully apprised of the situation.
If I hear anyone say a disparaging word about my bridge, I tend to take it personally. I want University Bridge to be shown in its best light. I find it really upsetting that it’s badly in need of a paint job, and that its rust is showing. I’m relieved that the bridge is due for a repaint in 2026, even though it will make my job a nightmare for about a year, as I’ll have to make sure about 100 painters are in safe places before every single bridge opening.
Right now it’s the most common color of all bridges in the United States. It’s officially called ODOT green, and I wrote a blog post about why that is, here. I call it institutional green, because that color is also associated with old hospitals, public schools, and mental institutions. It’s almost as if the color just sucks the spirit and ambition right out of a person. I hate that for my beloved bridge.
We already have another bridge in town, the Fremont Bridge, that was repainted in unique colors: Blue and Orange. The community seems to love it. That bridge feels like it’s been embraced by the neighborhood, and that’s as it should be.
If it’s good enough for Fremont, it should be good enough for University. Unfortunately, getting any department of transportation to make a radical change is akin to getting the Titanic to hang a sharp left to avoid that iceberg. It is rarely a success.
I have been suggesting for years that the bridge be painted the colors of the University of Washington. My bridge and the university have been practically standing side by side since 1932. I think those colors would not only get the community to embrace the bridge, but it also, maybe, possibly, might reduce the rampant graffiti that currently plagues it.
UW’s colors are purple and gold. So one reason for SDOT’s resistance to this idea is that the dark purple would make it harder to inspect the bridge for cracks, and it also might cause the bridge to expand even more as our summers get increasingly hot. I have to admit that SDOT has a point there. I wouldn’t want to do anything that wasn’t good for the bridge.
So I countered, “How about gold with purple highlights? This idea seemed to take hold. I got a tenuous response from an engineer that he’d make a note for them to buy those colors when the time came.
And since then, the University of Washington has expanded its official color palette, and some of the newer choices are much more bridge friendly. (Now I’m thinking that “Spirit Gold” or “Husky Gold” and “Accent Lavender” would be nice, but I’d settle for any two shown below at this point.) It’s not as if they’d cost more than the institutional green would. It’s simply a matter of getting people at the right level to sign off on it and change the paint codes on the plan.
Unfortunately, that time I made headway was about 8 years ago, and that engineer (and everyone in his chain of command who was on board with the idea), is no longer working for SDOT. So that left me back at square one. The problem with that is that I am viewed as a thorn in administration’s side, so no matter how plausible my suggestion may be, even if it would save the city a fortune or allow an entire department to work smarter, not harder, it is met with, “We’ll take that under advisement,” or “We’ll keep that in mind,” or “We’ll consider it.” All of that tends to be corporate speak for, “Shut up, don’t cause problems, and do your job.”
But University Bridge deserves to look special. It deserves to be embraced by the community. I watch students, parents, faculty and alumni cross this bridge every day. I open it to let their research vessels pass through. People stand on its sidewalks to cheer on the Huskies Rowing Team. Sailboats come through to go to Huskies home games. It’s as if this bridge were crying out to be some version of purple and gold.
My voice alone won’t turn this Titanic. So I decided to start a petition on Change.org, which gives more details. I’ve sent news of it to the UW newspaper, to KUOW, to King5, to the Seattle Times, to My Northwest, and to several sub-reddits and Facebook groups. (I’d be eternally grateful if someone posted it on X. I don’t do X. Never have.) I hope you will sign the petition. Even better, I hope you will share it. The more the word spreads, the more signatures I’ll get.
I’m just a bridgetender. SDOT finds it easy to ignore me. But I suspect they’d find it a lot harder to ignore a petition with thousands and thousands of signatures on it. I only started this campaign a few hours ago, and last time I checked before posting this, I already had 150 other people who want to see this bridge change color.
I like the idea of coming to visit my bridge when I’m 90, and seeing it still dressed up in purple and gold. I would smile silently to myself as people walked past. They wouldn’t know that I was the catalyst for its new, more beautiful look. On that day, that story would be between me and my old friend, the bridge. I’d linger there for a while, reminiscing, and I’m sure my bridge would agree that we will be forever grateful for all the people who backed us up and therefore made it happen.
I hope you are one of them, Dear Reader. Here’s the petition on Change.org:
Leave a Reply