The 506 m long steel bridge, consisting of eight spans, was designed by Stefan Szyller. Its construction, begun in 1904, was carried out by the K. Rudzki i S-ka company and supervised by engineers Mieczysław Marszewski and Wacław Paszkowski. Kazimierz Ołdakowski was another engineer who worked on the bridge, before he took over the directorship of Fabryka Broni. Despite being viewed by many as an extravagance, it was opened on January 6, 1914, by the Russian Governor General, Georgi Skalon, as Warsaw's third bridge; hence it was nicknamed "third bridge" by the city's residents, though its official name was Bridge of Our Most Gracious Ruler, Tsar Nicholas II. After Poland regained independence in 1918, the bridge was renamed after Prince Józef Poniatowski and acquired a new nickname — "Poniatoszczak" — which it retains to this day. The bridge suffered much during the World Wars. During the First World War, in 1915, the retreating Russian army blew up four of the spans to slow down the pursuing Germans. The bridge was hastily rebuilt by the Germans—only to burn down in an accident soon afterwards. After the war, the structure was rebuilt by the new Polish government over the course of five years, from 1921 to 1926. During the May Coup the bridge was the meeting place of the President of Poland, Stanisław Wojciechowski, and the leader of the coup, Marshal of PolandJózef Piłsudski. During the Second World War the bridge was destroyed by German troops during the Warsaw Uprising, on 13 September 1944. That demolition was much more complete: all spans were toppled, and only the lower piers survived. The first post-war plans by the new Polish government provided for the construction of a wooden temporary structure on the surviving pillars, but hasty work caused the bridge to collapse. Restored again on new pillars, the bridge was reopened again on 22 July 1946 by Bolesław Bierut. However, by now the reopened bridge had lost much of its pre-war splendor, as limited funds meant no resources to restore the various decorative neo-Polish renaissance features, such as the hand-made balustrades or stone benches. Some of the old pre-war benches, as well as one of the old spans, can be seen in the water near the bridge at low tide. Between 1963 and 1966 the bridge was widened, a trolley track was separated from the carriageway and the bridge was connected to the Wisłostrada expressway on the left bank of the Vistula by means of a long looping sloped roadway section which reminded some commentators of a snail's shell. During another repair and expansion in 1985-1990, when the roads on the right bank were expanded, a temporary bridge was erected. In 2004 a reconstruction and beautification program of the bridge began. By 2005 the small towers and the first four spans had been rebuilt. The tramway track was modernized and rebuilt in 2007.
