After a year of closure, the bridge spanning the Puyallup River reopened in 2019 with a sturdy new span and a brand new name. He also received the National Honor Award.
But today, the Fishing Wars Memorial Bridge is closed again after federal officials expressed concerns about the older sections of the nearly 100-year-old bridge, which used to carry about 15,000 vehicles a day. The city of Tacoma, Washington, has no plans to reopen because it must first raise millions of dollars for cleaning and testing.
“It's frustrating and it's hard to understand how we got here,” said Ed Wallace, who runs a Harley-Davidson motorcycle shop since the nearby bridge was closed.
Bridges serve an important function but are often overlooked until they close or collapse, resulting in loss of life and disruption, such as the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore early Tuesday morning. That bridge collapsed when it was hit by a cargo ship, but not because of poor maintenance. But thousands of others are in worse shape.
According to the federal government, the nation's 42,400 bridges are in poor condition and still carry about 167 million vehicles each day. Four-fifths of them have problems supporting themselves with their legs or supporting weight with their arms. And more than 15,800 of those bridges were in poor condition a decade ago, according to an Associated Press analysis.
One of these perennially poor bridges, which carries about 96,000 westbound vehicles each day on Interstate 195 over the Seekonk River in Rhode Island, suddenly closed late last year, forcing drivers to take a new route. The detour caused a long delay. In March, the governor announced that the bridge would need to be destroyed and replaced. It could cost up to $300 million and take at least two years to complete.
These closures are indicative of a nationwide problem.
“We haven't been able to keep our infrastructure up to speed for years, and now we're trying to catch up,” said Marcia Geldart Murphy, president of the American Society of Civil Engineers.
Closing old bridges due to safety concerns disrupts daily commutes, business supply chains, and emergency response times for police, firefighters, and health care workers. However, many bridges are still waiting to be replaced or repaired, as the cost can reach millions or even billions of dollars.
Fund injection
The massive infrastructure law signed by President Joe Biden in 2021 will spend $40 billion over five years on bridges, the largest dedicated bridge construction since construction of the Interstate Highway System began nearly 70 years ago. It's an investment.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said the legislation has already funded more than 7,800 bridge projects. One of his most notable projects is his $3.6 billion project in Cincinnati to build a long-awaited new bridge to carry traffic on Interstate 71 and I-75 over the Ohio River at the Kentucky border. It's a project.
But the infrastructure law's funding will only chip away at the estimated $319 billion in needed bridge repairs across the country, according to the National Highway Transportation Contractors Association.
“The bottom line is America's bridges need a lot of work,” Buttigieg told The Associated Press after visiting the closed Rhode Island Bridge. He added: “The sooner we can address these critical bridges, the less likely they are to suddenly become unusable or, worse, at risk of collapse.”
Inspectors rate bridges using a scale of 0 to 9, with a 7 or higher considered “good.” A “poor” rating represents a rating of 4 or less. A moderate rating is considered “fair.” The country's poor bridges are on average 70 years old.
Even before the federal funding infusion, the number of bridges in poor condition fell by 22% over the past decade as structures were repaired, replaced or permanently closed, according to an Associated Press analysis. But in recent years, more bridges have fallen from good to good condition.
collapsing bridge
A hole in a bridge can shock your car, but many of the most concerning problems lie beneath the surface. Chipped concrete or rusted steel can weaken the piers and beams that keep the bridge vertical. If the condition of the substructure or superstructure deteriorates too much, the bridge is usually closed for public safety reasons.
Although rare, a bad bridge can eventually collapse.
In 2007, a design flaw caused the Interstate 35 bridge over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis to collapse during evening rush hour. The collapse killed 13 people and injured 145 others. It was also a financial burden. A state analysis estimates that Minnesota's economy lost $60 million in 2007-2008 due to increased travel time and operating costs for commuters and businesses.
In January 2022, a bridge carrying a bus and several cars collapsed at Fern Hollow Creek in Pittsburgh, causing injuries but no deaths. Federal investigators determined that the steel legs had corroded to the point that they had visible holes, but inspectors were unable to calculate the severity of the problem and the city failed to follow repeated recommendations.
“This bridge didn't just collapse due to an act of God. It collapsed because of a lack of maintenance and repair,” said National Transportation Safety Board Commissioner Michael Graham.
economic challenges
Iowa has the poorest bridges, followed by Pennsylvania, Illinois and Missouri. His two bridges on Burlington Street in Iowa City, Iowa, illustrate the financial challenges faced by older bridges. The state owns the southbound section that carries vehicles across the Iowa River, while the city owns the northbound section, also known as Route 1.
Parts of the city built in 1915 were rated in poor condition in the 2023 and 2013 National Bridge Inventories. Inspection reports show numerous cracks and structural defects in the concrete bridge. The state side was built in his 1968 and is in much better condition.
Federal infrastructure legislation provided grants for the bridge analysis, but divided ownership has made it difficult to finance the estimated $30 million-plus replacement cost.
“It's not something you can raise money for in a year and say, 'Okay, let's hurry up and do it,'” said city engineer Jason Hubbell. “It takes years of planning and years of dedicated fundraising.”
economic effect
In Rhode Island, problems were growing with the Interstate 195 Washington Bridge, which connects Providence and East Providence. It was shut down in December after engineers noticed multiple broken steel tie rods in the concrete beams of two piers. Subsequent inspections revealed extensive structural problems.
Joseph McHugh, an engineer with 40 years of experience in bridge and road construction, reviewed draft technical reports compiled after the bridge closure, as well as inspection reports from July 2022 and July 2023. did.
“This failure didn't happen overnight,” McHugh told The Associated Press. “To me, it should have been discovered by an inspection, not by a contractor or someone who was monitoring what was going on.”
The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating allegations that false claims for payments for bridge construction, inspections, and repairs were submitted to the federal government.
Marco Pacheco, who owns a liquor store on a main road in East Providence's Portuguese neighborhood, said he believes “mismanagement,” “neglect” and “incompetence” led to the closure. Since the bridge was closed, his business revenue has decreased by 20%. But he's more concerned about the long-term effects.
“Traffic isn't coming back right away. People have reshaped their patterns and thought processes and things like that,” Pacheco said.
Washington business owners share similar concerns about the indefinite closure of the Fishing Wars Memorial Bridge in an industrial area near the Port of Tacoma. A few years ago, the city spent $42 million to replace the bridge to the river. But the bridge was suddenly closed again last October after the Federal Highway Administration expressed concerns that debris was preventing inspection of steel connections that could be corroded.
To clean and inspect the bridge, the city must first encapsulate it to prevent debris from falling into the river. However, the city lacks more than $6 million in funding needed for the project. There is also no way to pay for a potential $280 million replacement.
The nearby Interstate 5 bridge is a good alternative, but it means many drivers hop over the exit ramp without thinking about the Harley-Davidson store or other stores nearby. At least one store has already closed.
Wallace, the Harley-Davidson store owner, hopes the city can reopen the bridge, at least temporarily.
“Is there a danger?” Wallace asks rhetorically. “Yeah, definitely a very serious issue for me as a business owner.”
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Associated Press data writer Kavish Harjai contributed. Harjai is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
