Donald serves as Principal in Charge and Principal Designer for all projects at Donald MacDonald Architects, LLC. With more than 40 years of architectural experience, he brings deep expertise across every facet of bridge design, from conceptual planning and architectural enhancements to transportation operations, public engagement, landscape integration, and environmental considerations. His career is defined by successful collaboration with bridge engineers and multidisciplinary teams on some of the nation's most complex and celebrated signature bridges, including the $750 million Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge in Charleston, the 1,720‑foot Tilikum Crossing in Portland, and the $6.2 billion San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge.
A graduate of Columbia University, MacDonald has earned nearly 200 international, national, and regional awards for architectural design. He lectures widely on bridge architecture and design innovation and is a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects, recognized for his enduring contributions to the field.
The American School Archive, part of the University of Oklahoma (OU) Libraries' Western History Collection, recently acquired the Donald MacDonald Collection, including thousands of items representing his life's work.
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With 18 years of bridge design experience, Eric leads bridge aesthetics and architectural visioning in close collaboration with engineering partners across North America. His work centers on shaping clear, expressive design concepts that elevate structural logic and strengthen community identity. Over his career, Eric has guided the design of more than 40 signature bridges, including the three‑arch concept for the $1‑billion Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge and the $38‑million John Lewis Memorial Bridge. His multidisciplinary background, spanning bridge architecture, industrial design, and transportation and high‑rise projects, has earned international recognition and numerous design awards. Eric's approach blends technical rigor with a strong sense of narrative, ensuring that each structure contributes meaningfully to its place and the people it serves.
In 1966, Donald MacDonald Bridge Architects (DMD) established North America's most widely recognized and award-winning bridge architecture design firm. Today, Donald MacDonald Bridge Architects LLC continues this design excellence with a team focused on bridge designs that are emblematic of the people and places they serve. Operating as one office, this next-generation partnership offers a depth of resources and skills in locations across the United States and Canada.
Our Practice Focuses on Bridge Architecture and Aesthetics
Bridges are civic art, community connectors, and cultural attractions as much as they are about functional urban infrastructure. We work with our teams to elevate people's experience both using bridges and when viewing them from afar. What we do:
We have a long track record working with world-class cities, engineering partners, and public agencies to navigate complex regulatory, entitlement, and public engagement processes for major infrastructure works. Our solutions provide for vehicular and non-motorized access, universal design and accessibility, respond to local context; and comprise the latest technical solutions, sustainability and innovation.
Portland, Oregon's innovative and distinctive landmark, Tilikum Crossing, is the first major bridge in the U.S, carrying trains, buses, streetcars, bicycles, and pedestrians — but no private automobiles. When regional transportation agency TriMet began planning for the first bridge to be constructed across the Willamette River since 1973, the goal was to build something symbolic.
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An innovative landmark a quarter-century in the making, the new eastern span of the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge represents the latest spectacular chapter in the history of this storied structure. The new bridge's architect, Donald MacDonald, teams up with author Ira Nadel to create this illuminating book.
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Nine million people visit the Golden Gate Bridge each year, yet how many know why it's painted that stunning shade of "international orange"? Or that ancient Mayan and Art Deco buildings influenced the design? Current bridge architect Donald MacDonald answers these questions and others.
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Portland's Tilikum Crossing stands in a category of its own; a vibrant, multimodal bridge where light‑rail trains, streetcars, buses, cyclists, and pedestrians glide across the Willamette River while cars are intentionally left behind.
Story courtesy The Atlantic; Image courtesy TriMet
Miami's skyline is rising into a new era as the tallest of the six arches of the Miami Signature Bridge, the visionary composition known as The Fountain, nears completion. This $866‑million design‑build landmark is pushing the limits of global bridge engineering.
Story courtesy Engineering News Record, Scott Judy reporting
The New York Times recently spotlighted the remarkable public‑safety transformation brought by the Golden Gate Bridge's new suicide‑deterrent system, a miles‑long stainless‑steel net. Once averaging roughly 30 deaths per year, the bridge has seen an extraordinary drop since the system's completion.
Story courtesy New York Times, John Branch reporting from San Francisco