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Bridge On A Barge: Old Kosciuszko Bridge Dismantled, Shipped Down Newtown Creek

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- Now there's something you don't see often: a bridge on a barge.

Workers were moving the main span of the old Kosciuszko Bridge down Newtown Creek to the East River on Wednesday.

The slow process started Tuesday when crews used cables to lower the span -- 300 feet long, 89 feet wide and 50 feet tall at its highest point -- onto two barges.

In total, 26 million pounds of steel will be recycled from the main span and bridge approaches.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt opened the original structure in 1939.

The new bridge, which connects Greenpoint, Brooklyn and Maspeth, Queens over Newtown Creek, opened to traffic in April. A second span will be finished in 2020.

Once the project is fully completed, the Queens-bound bridge will carry five lanes of traffic, and the Brooklyn-bound bridge will carry four lanes. A 20-foot-wide bikeway-walkway will offer what Gov. Andrew Cuomo's offices describes as "spectacular views of Manhattan.''

State leaders say the new structure is built to last for the next 100 years.

The bridge's name honors Tadeusz Kosciuszko, a military engineer from Poland who came to fight for the independence of the American colonies.

(© Copyright 2017 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

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