The Golden Gate Bridge – Part IV

Some new views.

Part III appears here.

Some new views of the GGB, mostly taken from the walkway on the east side.

These Art Deco concrete columns are the pillars supporting the ‘Bridge within the Bridge’ on the south side:

The Bridge within the Bridge can be seen below. Mercifully, the architects decided not to destroy beautiful Fort Point, opting to span it with the sub-bridge you can see at the left here. There are four of the concrete Art Deco pillars supporting this sub-bridge, with the two main cables passing through these:

A slice of the walkway:

American pride abounds, and justifiably so:

Suspension cables – this is where you find out that your sensor needs cleaning!

Each tower contains 600,000 rivets, manually inserted when red hot, then hammered into place:

From the south-east approach:

Battery East from a point just west of the Presidio parking lot. Heavy guns used to be placed here to guard the entrance to the bay before the bridge was built and before rocket propelled weapons:

Looking north toward Marin County, the grain added in LR5:

All electronic toll gates:


Sadly, since my last visit this spring, the charming people taking your money at the toll gates have been replaced with cameras which photograph your registration plate then charge your credit card. Twenty-eight more jobs lost to technology. Sure, we save money, but we also lose our humanity with moves like this. Beck Diefenbach’s superb image testifies to a time now past.


Click the image for the story.

All images on the Nikon D3x using 20mm f/3.5 UD MF Nikkor, 35mm f/1.4 Sigma and 85mm f/1.8 MF Nikkor lenses.