Leopold Just (Latvian: Leopolds Justs, February 26, 1903 – February 25, 1999) was a Latvian-born engineer who came to New York City in 1921, and eventually became a partner in the Ammann & Whitney firm of consulting engineers. He was involved in the design of many major New York City bridges, including parts of the George Washington Bridge and the Lincoln Tunnel, the Throgs Neck Bridge linking the Bronx and Queens and, most notably, the Verrazzano–Narrows Bridge linking Staten Island with Brooklyn. His work outside of New York City included the Washington Metro, Ohio Turnpike and Connecticut Turnpike. He earned a degree in civil engineering from the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn in 1929, and died at age 95.
>>>PUT SHARE BUTTONS HERE<<<
In this Dossier
Leopold Just in the context of Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge
The Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge (/ˌvɛrəˈzɑːnoʊ/ VERR-ə-ZAH-noh; also referred to as the Narrows Bridge, the Verrazzano Bridge, and simply the Verrazzano) is a suspension bridge connecting the boroughs of Staten Island and Brooklyn in New York City, United States. It spans the Narrows, a body of water linking the relatively enclosed New York Harbor with Lower New York Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. It is the only fixed crossing of the Narrows. The double-deck bridge carries 13 lanes of Interstate 278: seven on the upper level and six on the lower level. The span is named for Giovanni da Verrazzano, who in 1524 was the first European explorer to enter New York Harbor and the Hudson River.
Engineer David B. Steinman proposed a bridge across the Narrows in the late 1920s, but plans were deferred over the next twenty years. A 1920s attempt to build a Staten Island Tunnel was aborted, as was a 1930s plan for vehicular tubes underneath the Narrows. Discussion of a tunnel resurfaced in the mid-1930s and early 1940s, but the plans were again denied. In the late 1940s, urban planner Robert Moses championed a bridge across the Narrows as a way to connect Staten Island with the rest of the city. Various problems delayed the start of construction until 1959. Designed by Othmar Ammann, Leopold Just, and other engineers at Ammann & Whitney, the bridge opened on November 21, 1964. The lower deck opened in 1969 to accommodate increasing traffic loads. The bridge was refurbished in the 1990s and again in the 2010s and 2020s.