It has starred in more car chases than Vin Diesel, more stunt scenes than Tom Cruise and more music videos than Madonna, and yet it never even had to audition for a part. Leaping across the Los Angeles river on its twin steel arcs, held aloft by its majestic art deco concrete pillars, the Sixth Street Bridge has provided a backdrop for shootouts and dance-offs ever since it was built in 1932, appearing in everything from Grease to Terminator 2, and providing a dose of urban glamour in videos by everyone from Kanye West to Kid Rock.
But Hollywood’s go-to crossing is no more. It was torn down in 2016 after being diagnosed with a terminal case of concrete cancer: the sand that was used in the mix turned out to have a lethally high alkali content, reacting with the cement to cause expansion and cracking. By the 2010s, officials calculated the bridge stood a 70% chance of collapsing in a major earthquake within the next 50 years.
