Total bridges
514
Public highway bridges in Queens County
County profile · official public datasets
Queens County, NY
514 public highway bridges tracked in the FHWA National Bridge Inventory: 30.4% rated Good, 62.3% Fair, 7.4% Poor.
- 514
- Public bridges
- 30.4%
- Good condition
- 7.4%
- Poor condition
The verdict
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory.
Queens County pairs a better-than-median Poor-condition share among rated counties in the state with an older average build year than the state inventory.
- Top 26%
- lowest Poor share in state
- 7.4%
- Poor-condition share
- 514
- public highway bridges
- 1966
- avg year built
Poor is an FHWA condition category from the lowest applicable component rating (4 or below), not a live crossing-safety or closure decision. Rankings cover counties with at least five public highway bridges.
Queens County Bridge Snapshot
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory, Queens County ranks #16 of 62 New York counties with at least 5 public highway bridges on Poor-condition share (lower share ranks better; currently 7.4%). Queens County, New York contains 514 public highway bridges. Roughly 30.4% are rated “Good,” 62.3% “Fair,” and 7.4% “Poor.” Poor means the lowest applicable deck, superstructure, substructure, or culvert rating is 4 or below on the 0–9 NBI scale. It is a condition category, not a live safety or closure decision.
Responsible agencies inspect covered bridges on risk-based intervals under current NBIS rules and submit inventory data to FHWA annually. The list below shows every NBI-tracked bridge in the county. Use the “Sort by” controls to change the ordering, and click any row for its reported inspection date, traffic count, and condition fields.
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory. See methodology for full definitions.
Good condition
30.4%
156 of 514 rated 7-9
Fair condition
62.3%
320 of 514 rated 5-6
Poor condition
7.4%
38 of 514 rated 4 or below
In-state Poor-share rank
#16 of 62
Among New York counties with 5+ bridges, lower share ranks better
Condition distribution
Share of 514 NBI-tracked bridges by lowest applicable component rating.
Good 30.4% (156)
Fair 62.3% (320)
Poor 7.4% (38)
Queens County's Poor-condition bridges carry 1,715,478 vehicle crossings a day
That is 10.8% of the county's reported daily bridge traffic on 8.3% of its bridges: Poor-condition structures carry more traffic than their share of the inventory. Each Poor bridge averages 47,652 crossings a day against 38,182 for a Good-condition one. A Poor rating is a condition category, not a closure or a live safety judgement; it means the lowest applicable component rating is 4 or below.
Computed over the 434 of 514 bridges in this county that report an average daily traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
70.8% of Queens County's bridges have passed the 50-year mark
364 of the 514 bridges with a recorded construction year were built in 1974 or earlier. Age alone is not a defect: a well-maintained older bridge can rate Good, and 30.4% of this county's inventory does. Even so, this older cohort is the population from which future Poor ratings are drawn, which is why the age profile below matters alongside the condition split above.
Cutoff derives from the 2024 release year minus a 50-year design life. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
One structure carries 10.7% of the county's Poor-condition bridge traffic
RTE I678 over FLUSHING BAY PROMENADE, built 1963, carries 183,587 vehicles a day, the most of any Poor-rated structure here. The county's Poor-condition exposure is concentrated rather than evenly spread, so the 38-bridge count understates how much of the daily burden sits on a single crossing.
Share is of the 1,715,478 daily crossings on Poor-rated bridges that report a traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
When Queens County's bridges were built
514 bridges with a recorded construction year, grouped by decade
- pre-1900 2
Built before 1900
2 bridges
- 1900s 8
1900–1909
8 bridges
- 1910s 28
1910–1919
28 bridges
- 1920s 8
1920–1929
8 bridges
- 1930s
1930–1939
60 bridges
- 1940s 40
1940–1949
40 bridges
- 1950s
1950–1959
57 bridges
- 1960s
1960–1969
139 bridges
- 1970s 22
1970–1979
22 bridges
- 1980s 33
1980–1989
33 bridges
- 1990s 19
1990–1999
19 bridges
- 2000s 46
2000–2009
46 bridges
- 2010s 25
2010–2019
25 bridges
- 2020s 27
2020–2029
27 bridges
What this shows Construction peaked in the 1960s, when 139 of the county's bridges still in the inventory were built, which is 27% of those with a recorded year. That cohort is now 55 to 64 years old in the 2024 inventory. Its average build year is 1966, 6 years older than the New York average of 1972.
How Queens County compares with New York's closest counties by inventory size
The 5 New York counties nearest Queens County in number of bridges, with their condition splits. Its 7.4% Poor share is the 2nd-lowest of these 6. Its average build year of 1966 against a peer-group mean of 1976 is 10 years older.
Showing the 5 closest of 61 New York counties eligible for comparison.
| County | Bridges | Good | Fair | Poor | Avg. built |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chautauqua County | 559 | 44% | 46.3% | 9.7% | 1977 |
| Queens County (this page) | 514 | 30.4% | 62.3% | 7.4% | 1966 |
| Oneida County | 496 | 46.2% | 42.3% | 11.5% | 1972 |
| Cattaraugus County | 484 | 55.4% | 38.4% | 6.2% | 1982 |
| Onondaga County | 472 | 29% | 61% | 10% | 1974 |
| Orange County | 472 | 25.4% | 59.3% | 15.3% | 1974 |
Each share is of that county's own total tracked bridges; peers are the counties with 5 or more bridges whose inventory size is closest to Queens County's. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
Nationwide counties with similar inventory size or average build year
Two NBI-derived peer sets for Queens County, both outside New York so the neighborhoods are not the same-state size table above.
Similar inventory size
Nearest county inventories outside NY (514 bridges here).
- Montgomery County, MD · 515 bridges
- Grayson County, TX · 513 bridges
- Douglas County, NE · 509 bridges
- Williamson County, TN · 520 bridges
Similar average build year
Nearest mean year-built outside NY (1966 here).
- Butler County, KS · avg 1966 · 591 bridges
- Grafton County, NH · avg 1966 · 544 bridges
- Lehigh County, PA · avg 1966 · 381 bridges
- Osage County, OK · avg 1966 · 366 bridges
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release. Peers floor at 10 bridges so stub inventories cannot own the match.
Good-condition bridges (156)
RTE I278
GoodOver: 31ST AVENUE
.3 MI N JCT I278 & SH 25A, Queens, NY
Built 2002 Load: 84.4 t ADT: 5,477
149TH STREET
GoodOver: LIRR PORT WASH BR
IN FLUSHING, Queens, NY
Built 1924 Load: 84.4 t
907MX511001
GoodOver: UNION TPKE WB TO GCP WB
Kew Gardens Interchange, Queens, NY
Built 2019 Load: 86.2 t
221ST STREET
GoodOver: LIRR PORT WASH BR
IN BAYSIDE, Queens, NY
Built 1988 Load: 88.0 t ADT: 7,248
RTE 908B
GoodOver: RTE I678 RTE I678 RTE
JCT GCP+ROUTE 678, Queens, NY
Built 1963 Load: 99.9 t ADT: 25,285
RTE I278
GoodOver: NORTHERN BLVD
JCT I278 & SH 25A, Queens, NY
Built 2004 Load: 99.9 t ADT: 143,258
Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.
Related
Data sourced from official public datasets. See our methodology for details. Retrieved and formatted by PlainBridges
Every figure on PlainBridges is rendered directly from federal source data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page draws directly on federal source data, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. NBI condition categories reflect the latest reported inventory record, not a live safety, closure, or travel decision.