Los Angeles, California, USA

Michael Maltzan Architecture, along with HNTB Corporation and Hargraeves Associates have designed the Sixth Street Viaduct (also known as the Sixth Street Bridge) as a modern reinterpretation of the original structure, with a distinctive series of ten sweeping arches that give the bridge its signature look.

These arches are both aesthetic and structural, supporting the roadway and enhancing the bridge’s visual impact.

The viaduct, called the Ribbon of Light, creates a dramatic new urban symbol for LA while bringing much needed new community resources to the area.

The design evolves the monoculture of a single-use bridge into an intermodal multiculture welcoming motorists, cyclists, and pedestrians alike.

For its design qualities, the Sixth Street Viaduct has been awarded a 2024 International Architecture Award by The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design and The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies.

It seeks to overcome the silo effect caused in the past by infrastructure, countering it with the vibrancy and connectiveness of a civic structure.

Equal parts architecture and engineering, the new viaduct is a tied arch bridge, defined by ten pairs of arches that rise and fall along the edges of the entire structure as it extends 3,500 feet from east to west.

Paying homage to the design of the earlier bridge, the new viaduct places the tallest pairs of its sculptural arches over the LA River, where the original arches stood, and positions another taller pair as a gateway on the east.

The segmentally constructed arches cant outward, appearing to embrace the deck and open to the sky. The repetitive forms create sequential views of the city for travelers moving along the bridge, as if they were frames in a film.

In addition to providing lanes for motorists, the design incorporates dedicated bicycle lanes and 8-foot sidewalks for pedestrians.

Ramps including the paperclip and helical ramps and stairs serve as a connection from the bridge deck to the neighborhood below.

A new 12-acre public park below the bridge, designed by Hargreaves/Jones Associates as Landscape Architect, will be accessible from the deck level by ADA-compliant multiple stairways and a monumental helical bike ramp.

Known as the PARC (Parks, Arts, River, and Connectivity Improvements), the open recreational space will connect Boyle Heights, the Arts District, and the Los Angeles River. It will be served by improved streets, intersections, and bike lanes.

The PARC will be an inviting green space for gathering, with opportunities for sports, performances, recreational programs, and public art that will benefit the community and the whole city.

Giving the viaduct its name of Ribbon of Light, linear LED lights are built above and below the decks into the traffic barriers, providing low-to-the-ground street and pedestrian lighting and adding to the drama of crossing the bridge. Accent lighting from below the deck illuminates the undersides of the arches.

The bridge, visible from many parts of the city, will have the ability to be illuminated as a civic beacon.

Through an international competition conducted by the City of Los Angeles’s Bureau of Engineering under the leadership of City Engineer Gary Lee Moore, with guidance from a distinguished nine-member Design Aesthetics Advisory Committee, Michael Maltzan Architecture was selected to be the Bridge Design Architect for the new Sixth Street Viaduct with HNTB as the Engineer of Record.

The $588 million Sixth Street Viaduct is the largest bridge project in the history of Los Angeles. It is funded by the Federal Highway Transportation Administration, the California Department of Transportation, and the City of Los Angeles.

Project: Los Angeles Sixth Street Viaduct
Architects: Michael Maltzan Architecture, Inc.
Lead Architect: Michael Maltzan
Design Team: Tim Williams, Paul Stoelting, Matthew Austin, Deysi Blanco, Casey Benito, William Carson, Scott Carter, Lord Ceniza, Roger Cortes, Michael Faciejew, Mehr Khanpour, Yu Li, Ann Soo, Jose Thomas, Hiroshi Tokumaru, Gee-Ghid Tse, and Jennifer Wu
Architects of Record and Engineers of Record: HNTB Corporation
Urban Planning Consultants: AC Martin Partners
Landscape Architects: Hargraeves Associates
General Contractor: Skanska Stacy and Witbeck, a Joint Venture
Client: Bureau of Engineering and Department of Public Works, City of Los Angeles
Photographers: Iwan Baan and Gary Leonard