Acosta Bridge in Jacksonville, Florida

The Acosta Bridge is the fixed highway bridge over the St. Johns River at Hendricks Point in Downtown Jacksonville, the second structure to carry the name and the one that takes the JTA Skyway across to San Marco.

NOAA's U.S. Coast Pilot 4, Chapter 9 (October 11, 2026), counts it as the second of four bridges at Hendricks Point, 0.3 mile upstream from the Main Street bridge, with a fixed span and a clearance of 74 feet. The Florida Department of Transportation's Historic Highway Bridges of Florida, 2010 Update records that the original Acosta Bridge was replaced by FDOT Nos. 720570 and 720571, two FDOT bridge numbers.

The Jacksonville Transportation Authority's history timeline lists 1998 as the year Skyway service opened between Hemming Plaza and FCCJ stations and across the Acosta Bridge to San Marco.

The original was a vertical lift bridge built from 1919 to 1921 and called the Saint Johns River Bridge until 1949, according to the State Archives of Florida.

A Florida Memory record of a postcard view, N028499, says the bridge was built by the Missouri Valley Bridge and Iron Co. of Leavenworth, Kansas, with a superstructure by Bethlehem Steel. FDOT's report describes the Acosta Bridge over the St. Johns River in Jacksonville as a notable city-constructed bridge built after World War I and the first vertical lift span in the State, chosen because of the river's operating needs from heavy maritime traffic.

FDOT credits several engineering firsts to the Jacksonville job. Its designer, J. L. Harrington, had a national reputation as an engineer and co-founder of a prominent engineering firm; the Missouri Valley Bridge and Iron Company built the foundation and was experienced in sub-aqueous construction; and the work required pneumatic methods never before used in the region to sink the caissons. The report gives the bridge's size as 2,865 feet and its cost as $1.2 million, and calls it a fitting symbol of the booming 1920s and their ever-increasing automobile traffic.

The bridge's namesake, Councilman St. Elmo Acosta, convinced Jacksonville voters to approve a $950,000 bond issue to build it, according to FDOT.

The State Archives' captions agree on his role. A 1987 aerial photograph in the Florida Memory print collection describes the Acosta Bridge as named for city councilman Elmo Acosta, who pushed for the construction of the bridge, built in 1921. A Department of Commerce photograph dated August 1, 1949 carries the same note, the year the postcard record says the Saint Johns River Bridge was renamed the Acosta Bridge.

FDOT's report gives two money figures for the Jacksonville bridge: the $950,000 bond issue Acosta championed with voters and a total cost of $1.2 million. It does not say how the difference was paid.

The official sources date the replacement of the Jacksonville lift bridge to both 1991 and 1994.

Two Florida Memory captions, on the 1949 Department of Commerce photograph and the July 1987 aerial view taken from the CSX Building, say the bridge was replaced in 1991. FDOT's report gives 1991 in one sentence, saying the Acosta Bridge was replaced in 1991 by FDOT Nos. 720570 and 720571, and 1994 a few lines later, saying that in 1994 the state replaced the Acosta Bridge and the remnants of the historic span became an artificial reef for Atlantic sea life. The page states both dates because the sources do.

The new Acosta Bridge is a different kind of bridge. The Coast Pilot lists the Acosta highway bridge with a fixed span, where the 1921 bridge had a vertical lift, and gives it a clearance of 74 feet, so it has no movable span.

The JTA Skyway monorail crosses the St. Johns on the Acosta Bridge to reach its Southbank stations in San Marco, a service the JTA dates to 1998.

The JTA timeline traces the system from 1985, when the authority received more than $23 million from the Urban Mass Transportation Administration to build the Automated Skyway Express, to 1989, when the Skyway starter line, spanning seven-tenths of a mile, began operations, and 1998, when service across the Acosta Bridge to San Marco opened. The JTA's Skyway page describes a 2.5-mile long, elevated monorail system and lists three stations on the South Bank side: San Marco Station at Mary St. and San Marco Blvd., Riverplace Station at Mary St. and Flagler Ave., and Kings Avenue Station at Kings Ave. and Nira St., where the JTA offers Park-n-Ride parking.

As of October 18, 2026, the JTA page says the Skyway is a complimentary service with no charge, runs Monday to Friday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. with Saturday and Sunday service for special events only, and that Skyway operations will be pausing on November 2, 2026.

Four bridges cross the river at Hendricks Point, and the Acosta sits second, between the Main Street lift bridge and the railroad bascule, in the Coast Pilot's list.

Sources: clearances from the Coast Pilot; build years for the railroad and Fuller Warren bridges from the 1987 Florida Memory aerial record, which says the railroad bridge was built in 1925 by the Florida East Coast Railway and the Fuller Warren Bridge in 1954; Acosta dates from FDOT and Florida Memory. The Coast Pilot notes that the bridge tenders at Hendricks Point monitor VHF-FM channel 16 and work on channel 17, while the FEC bridgetender works on channel 13.

The San Marco Preservation Society organized its own centennial program for the bridge in the last week of June 2021, according to the society.

The society's announcement described a talk on Thursday, June 24, 2021 by local author and historian Wayne Wood at 6:00 p.m. in the fellowship hall at Southside Baptist Church, 1435 Atlantic Blvd., and an antique car parade it sponsored on Saturday, June 26, 2021 at 11:00 a.m. The parade route started near MOSH, crossed the Acosta Bridge northbound, circled back on Bay Street, crossed again southbound and continued down San Marco Blvd. to San Marco Square, with festivities and light refreshments in Balis Park.

Last verified: October 18, 2026, against FDOT's 2010 historic bridge report, three State Archives of Florida photograph records, the JTA timeline and Skyway page, NOAA's Coast Pilot 4 Chapter 9 and the San Marco Preservation Society's own event notice.