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| New Mississippi river bridge project Preliminary results of the re-evaluation study commissioned by the Illinois and Missouri Departments of Transportation outline a plan to reduce the total cost for the New Mississippi River Bridge to a little more than $900 million for a cost savings of roughly $700 million. Under the revised plan, the project will continue to meet its original goals of easing congestion and traffic, improving safety and national security, and generating economic benefits for the metro-east area, while remaining aesthetically pleasing to users and residents. Some of the cost savings will come from building a new river bridge with a shorter center span and narrowing the space between eastbound and westbound lanes. The goal is to build a combination of project segments that will provide a new bridge across the Mississippi River, along with the necessary interstate and local highway connections and opening this network by 2013. The New Mississippi River Bridge Project has been earmarked to receive $239 million from the federal transportation bill and the states will need to identify the remaining $671 million to completely fund the project. Officials and lawmakers are discussing several options to secure funding. write your comments about the article :: © 2005 Construction News :: home page |