R.I. Begins Construction of Replacement Highway Bridge

By Michele Fuetsch, Staff Reporter

This story appears in the May 11 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.

Rhode Island transportation officials said construction has begun on one of two bridges so deteriorated that trucks are limited to 18 tons and two axles.

Last month, ground was broken for the new Sakonnet River Bridge, which carries Route 24 between Tiverton and Portsmouth south to Newport. The new bridge will cost $164 million to build and is expected to be completed in 2012.

Construction to replace the Pawtucket River Bridge, which carries the northbound and southbound lanes of Interstate 95, is scheduled to begin next spring, according to officials in the Rhode Island Department of Transportation.

“They’re both huge projects that really [were] affecting the industry,” said John Atwood, president of the Rhode Island Trucking Association.

“I want to say 5,000 to 6,000 trucks a day go through the state, so, to have that type of bridge on the interstate system, it’s somewhat inconvenient,” Atwood said of the Pawtucket crossing.

“A five-axle tractor trailer can’t go over empty because it’s over on the axles, so, it’s very restrictive,” he added.

Each bridge is more than a half-century old. Since the weight and axle limits were put in place, first at 22 tons and later at 18 tons in May 2008, more than $1 million in fines have been paid by truckers violating the ban on the Pawtucket River Bridge.

Atwood said the worth of the tickets written actually has been more than

$1 million but that some fines have been reduced in court. The base fine for a single truck, he said, is $3,000 but can be higher, depending on how overweight the vehicle is.

To avoid the Pawtucket River Bridge, trucks are being routed farther north around Providence on Interstate 295 into Massachusetts.

During construction, traffic will continue to flow on the old spans at both the Sakonnet and Pawtucket crossings, said Charles St. Martin, spokesman for RIDOT.

Money for construction of both new bridges is a combination of federal and state funding.