Originally built in 1952, it was reconstructed and widened in 1995 through an unusual process which greatly reduced the time the important commuter artery was out-of-service from conventional methods.

The current 3,750-foot (1,140 m)-long double-swing-span bridge carries United States Route 17, a four-lane arterial highway.

The movable span is needed to allow ship access to several military installations that are upstream of the bridge, most notably, the United States Navy's Naval Weapons Station Yorktown.

The bridge has been one of the sites of a special program to establish and encourage nesting locations for the peregrine falcon population of Virginia.

Tolls are only collected northbound, and are used to pay for the expansion of the bridge to four lanes.