Getting one more year out of the bridge

On Sept. 3, the bridge over the Mississippi River turned 74 years old. It just needs to last one more year until its replacement is finished, but state transportation officials have learned it is deteriorating faster than they expected and now are working quickly to help it make it to its 75th -- and last -- birthday.

"We've got to go in and beef it up," said area engineer Stan Johnson, who is coordinating the project. "It's safe, but we just need to do some work on it to make sure it stays safe."

As work continued on the new $100 million Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge, Missouri Department of Transportation crews began working on the old bridge Monday. Work is planned from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Repairs to the connections underneath the Illinois approach over land started Monday. Repairs to the connections over the river will begin today. Starting at 8 a.m. today, traffic on the bridge will be limited to one lane this week.

Johnson said they are going to reinforce the bridge by putting in new steel plates next to existing plates to support the beams.

A routine inspection last week revealed that some of the steel connections between the floor beams, which run across and underneath the roadway, and stringers, which are beams that run under the center line of the roadway -- had deteriorated, Johnson said. Johnson said that deterioration was shown by the degree of rust."We've got to go in and bolster some of those connections by reinforcing what's already there," Johnson said. "It's deteriorating faster than we had anticipated, and we wanted to do this before it becomes a problem."

The work is expected to last a couple of weeks. Johnson said that because that MoDOT labor was being used, an immediate cost estimate was unavailable.

'The bridge is safe'

But Johnson stressed that the bridge is safe to use.

"If it wasn't, we'd shut it down," he said. "What we're trying to do is see that it remains safe so we can run traffic on it for the next year. The bridge is safe, there's no question about that. We're not going to put anybody in danger."

But the stability of the bridge is worrisome enough that the transportation department is looking at ways to get traffic on the Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge, which is expected to be finished next fall, before it is completely done.

"It's partly that," Johnson said. "There's nothing definite, but depending on how it works out, there are some things we can do to get traffic on it before everything is done. Of course, we'd do that in a safe way, too."

But the safety aspect is only part of the reason they are considering that, he said.

"The other part of it is we've spent a ton of money on it, so the sooner we can use it the better," he said. "Even without the deterioration, the old bridge is very narrow and people want to start using the new bridge."

People who use the existing bridge were of mixed opinions on how safe it is.

"I'm not scared to go across it because my son-in-law says it's safe," said Phyllis Duffell, who owns Courtney's Restaurant in East Cape Girardeau, Ill.

Duffell's son-in-law is an engineer working on the new bridge, she said. She said, however, she has heard from those who are ready to use the new bridge.

"A lot of people who come into the restaurant can't wait for the new one to get built," she said. "With all the bumps you hit, plus all the traffic. You can see why they're ready. But I'm not scared of it."

But Christen Jackson is. She drives across it several times each day to get from her East Cape Girardeau home to her job at Rhodes Convenience Store on the other side of the bridge on Morgan Oak.

"It does make me nervous," she said. "I got stopped because of the work, and I could feel the whole bridge shake, and it was pretty scary. I can't wait until they get the new one done."

smoyers@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 137