Crews installed the main truss of the new bridge in March. (Photo via DDOT)

District officials signed off yesterday on the last bits of a long-awaited bridge for bicycles and pedestrians to fill in more of the Anacostia Riverwalk Trail. With the new span, cyclists will now be able to use the trail without having to navigate a trepidatious set of rail tracks.

The bridge, constructed from a fiberglass-reinforced polymer, travels over a rail yard owned by the freight company CSX. Until now, people using the trail have had to cross a bumpy, uneven mess of rails, gravel, and forbidding “restricted access” signs.

The bridge measures 1,185 feet long, and the main span is protected by a steel frame that, along with the main construction, is designed to reduce maintenance costs and environmental impacts. The District Department of Transportation boasts that the new structure is one of the longest of its kind in the United States.

A similar bridge crossing the CSX tracks west of the Anacostia River was completed in April 2012.

The crossing is located on the north bank of the Anacostia, just north of the John Philip Sousa Bridge that carries Pennsylvania Avenue SE. It is part of a larger project by D.C., Maryland, and federal officials to eventually fill in the 20 miles of Anacostia riverfront in the District with bike and pedestrian trails that connect to a 40-mile trail that continues into Maryland.

The bridge brings D.C.’s total of completed Anacostia bike trails to 12 miles. Among the other missing segments is the four-mile Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens segment, which, when completed, will connect Bladensburg Road NE in the District with Bladensburg Waterfront Park in Maryland. Some $15 million has been put forward to complete the trail, with $3.5 coming from D.C. coffers, $1.5 million from a bike trail fund launched in 2011 by Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, and the remainder from a U.S. Transportation Department grant.