Cypress Freeway, Oakland California

[RepoLife]

Wow I also still noticed that the Speed Limit and the "Turn Only" Signs were still Black and White (Black Background/White Lettering).

[JTS11511]

I-880 is the Nimitz Freeway. The (formerly) elevated/double deck section was known as the Cypress Structure. This was done to help idendify the elevated portion of the freeway. It was so named because Cypress St. ran parallel with the double deck section. The collapse section was from the Bay Bridge transiton ramp to about 5th St. 16th St. is way south of the Cypress Structure, and nowhere near the elevated section.

[sicoch]

I lived in the Emeryville Warehouse, not far from the Cypress structure, when the quake hit....

[thejazzenigma]

Today as I post this message, 10/17/2009, twenty years has gone by since the Earthquake. RIP the victims of this freeways collapse.

Danny

[drewbacsi]

I thought it was called the Nimitz.

[vinnieagogo]

I worked as a teenager at the wrecking yard at 26th & willow right next to the cypress.

I lived there for a while.

Oakland Scavenger used to park their garbage trucks underneath the cypress when their place was on 28th

I've seen that neighborhood change.

[datalal624]

Having seen a little bit of the Cypress Street freeway construction vids elsewhere on YouTube, where it looks like they drive along the same stretch of road, this is video is even creepier watching it the second time around. I think the music helps that feeling, too, although it is a nice synthesized arrangement.

[thejazzenigma]

You have to remember the whole thing did not collapse.

If you look at video clips of the earthquake on here, you will notice that. Only the portion from the Bay Bridge transition to around 16th Street collapsed.

Danny

[roflwaffle12321]

i love oakland

[paulthomas2010]

I used to drive to Alameda from my new home in San Francisco to go to work between 5:30 and 6 for the closing shift. Often I would be on the upper deck between 5-5:15. I only worked that shift for a few weeks before a few weeks prior to oct 17th. I could have been on the freeway at that exact moment >.> My mother lost a friend on the upper deck riding in a van pool. Even though she was on the upper deck, it buckled and came down killing everyone in the van.

[animegrl2000]

Thanks for posting this! I had never seen it before the collapse.

[bluelblock]

Nice video. My mom and dad used to work in the city (for Kron, in fact) and my mom almost left work early that day to go to an Oakland A's rally in Jack London square. It's a good thing she didn't because she would have been on the cypress structure when it collapsed. I was born in 1990... I'm very glad she decided to stay in the city that day!

[mrivera1]

Nice quality for an almost 20 year old video.

[54spiritedwill54]

Awesome video

[rcktmanil]

The music sounds to me like a synthesized version of Rachmaninoff's Vocalise. It's a beautiful piece, but creepy in this instance.

[fellafella101]

just finished my last essay at university, and it was all about the loma prieta earthquake. the cypress street viaduct collapse definitely gave me lots to write about - its interesting to see what i've been writing about for the last few days while it was still standing. not surprised it collapsed looking at those flimsy pillars that were holding it up! i agree with SFGuy77 about the music - what the fuck is going on there?

[TruSlack]

what can I say? That was what was in my cassette deck at the time. Tomita, if I recall. The intro music to the clip (plays under the first slide) is simply from a AV production package. Looking back, I suppose that was kind of strange stuff to be listening to....

[socalltd]

check out the constructiion footage in 5 parts from the mid-50's. cool yet creepy knowing what happened :(

[chiriga79]

Oh my god i remember that....we lived on fifth ave and and east eighteenth at the time ...I also remember walkink past the ruins on the way to get water at the salvation army after the earthquake...it was so sad

[SFGuy77]

It is eery. And what's with the creepy music?

[rexboyo]

Too eery. I used that freeway every Tuesday on my way to SF at around 5pm. The day I decided not use it was the last day the double-deck freeway was still standing. Thank God for traffic report - heard there was a jam on 880 because of the World Series game. I made a last minute change to take San Mateo Bridge instead...

[miked36258]

i work on 10th st. in oakland i drive down mandela parkway every day. (formaly cypress st.) it looks very different today than it did in the video. that street is full of people walking dogs and riding bikes now. if you did not know the history you would never even know the cypress freeway was ever there. creepy.

[socalltd]

on oct 3rd, i was there on mandela prkwy. (from los angeles)i drove the entire distance top to bottom and all around the area. found a small memorial park named "15 seconds" its all in the past and now 20 yrs on one would never think why the parkway is like that. very quiet and uncomforting that morning

[dbpvallejo]

i was an emt for acme western ambulance. the day of the quake ALL resources were sent to cypress structure. all of us who knew the route well had our hearts in our throats as any other day there would have been at least 500 cars on the lower deck during rush hour. the game changed everything for the better.

triage was established within 1/2 a block and then moved a few hours later to 2 blocks away as caltrans couldn't determine if it would stay up. there's a good embarcadero on youtube, too.

[Dook6]

RIP all who died in Loma Prieta 20 years later

[MayfairMal]

After the earthquake, BART cut down the ornamental colonnade on the West Oakland BART station platforms due to structural damage. I always thought this double-decker freeway with its large mature trees was less disruptive to the West Oakland than the superwide landscaped I-980 is.

[socalltd]

if anyone has inside footage of the nimitz or the embarcadero please post. did they rebuild?

[sky1beam]

The old Cypress freeway is now a garden

[DoubleK2000]

Where was the earth quake?

[jamie6754]

Cypress Freeway wht about it ?

[ecsson]

I used to drive a delivery truck around the bay area. I remember being stuck in traffic on the lower deck (headed to the bay bridge)a number of times, right at the time of the earthquake, and the roadway would shake with the traffic from above. Every time I would think, I wouldn't want to be here during an earthquake. Thank God I wasn't.

[bago510]

this video is both creepy and interesting because of what happened there on october 17 i remember the cypress structure and the earthquake like it was yesterday i grew up in east oakland on fruitvale and remember the cypress freeway clearly an interesting note is that the 14 st exit you see in the video is now a fire house and a memorial park of what happened here rip to thsoe that parish in that dam structure

[kuroneko99]

Both my brother and step-father separately drove past that section of the Cypress moments before the earthquake. This was obviously years before cell-phones and after the earthquake for a while my mother didn't know where they were. They're of course fine, thank god.

[lickon1968]

that brings back old memories... i drove on that everyday.

[melamia71]

Wipe off your window please... (:

[default99telecom]

Was that Starsky & Hutch passing in the Torino?

[dudeinoakland]

Thank you

[franxjam]

uta el video weno O_o

[pimpHO87]

Thank you for this video tape. I've always wanted to see something like this. I just wish I could now find an old video of someone driving on the old Cypress as well as the old Embarcadero Freeway from San Francisco.

[TruSlack]

Back when this tape was made, I shot a complete run of the Cypress from South Oakland to the Toll Plaza for a student film. None of the footage made it into the final project, but I am still hoping to find the raw material...

[sky1beam]

How many days was that before the earthquake

[Dook6]

Look at I 280 from the 101-interchange in SF they still have a double decker freeway there. I am afraid that the double decker I-280 will fall down the same way Cypress did. If the Central Freeway, and Embarcadero were demolished for this reason why not I-280 from the 101 interchange from SF.

[socalltd]

damage to the 280 was not as bad like the 480 or extreme like on the cypress. so they repaired and retrofited the colums from th 101 up. it took 5 yrs. central fwy did not have any big problems, it was just ugly and finaly knocked in '96 and re-done. i have seen a map of the planned fwys for S.F. things would have been worst if the central, embarcadero, Hwy 1 and a conector fwy from ca1 to the central fwy were built. majoraty would have been doubled decked too.

[dutchfucker]

tone car passed a big truck in the intersection. Not supposed to change lanes in an intersection. Thought I'd point it out.

[than217]

Awesome vid

[odin0275]

i used to take cypress freeway to a night club called the omni in oakland years ago.

[JBauer2635]

What exit was that you turned onto the Nimitz?

[TruSlack]

Waaay to long ago to remember. I do know that to the right of the onramp was the post office and the West Oakland BART station. The street I was on (heading east to west) is now MLK.

[thejazzenigma]

you first started down West Grand, turned south on Cypress, then turned east on 7th Street. Martin Luther King Jr. Way is several blocks from Cypress, which runs parallel to it. It's old name was Grove, and not 7th Street. Just thought I let you know.

[NEPatriot]

Given the events of what would happen later in 1989, this is freaky.

[ihatetaft]

I agree, very very freaky.