New Senate Bill Aims to give $125 million to Hood River Bridge Replacement
A design rendering of the new bridge. According to a December report from the Port of Hood River, the new bridge will address issues such as river navigation, vehicle travel, pedestrian and bicycle connections, and safety.
by Cole Goodwin
Hood River–A new bipartisan bill, Oregon Senate Bill 431, has been introduced to provide $125 million in state funding for the construction of a new Hood River-White Salmon Bridge which needs to be replaced due to its aging structures, narrow lanes, height, and weight limits.
The nearly 100-year-old structure, which was built in 1924, provides a vital crossing over the Columbia River serves an average of 4 million users annually. The Port of Hood River has invested over $22 million in capital improvements and maintenance on the bridge in the past two decades to keep it safe and operational.
The cost to replace the bridge is estimated to be $520 million, and while $95 million in funding has been secured, including $75 million from Move Ahead Washington funding and $20 million from other various grants, the project still requires additional funding. The Port of Hood River has also applied for $685 million in grants from the U.S. Department of Transportation, although no grants have been awarded yet.
The new bill is sponsored by Senator Daniel Bonham and Representative Jeff Helfrich, along with co-sponsors Senators Findley, Gorsek, and Hansell, as well as Representatives Lewis, McLain, and Pham K. If the bill passes, the bridge replacement project will reach 42.3% of its funding goal in July of 2023.
According to Michael Shannon, the project director, the bipartisan and regional representation of the bill's sponsors demonstrates broad support for funding the new bridge, which is also reflective of the unanimous support for the project in the local Gorge constituencies.
"We encourage our local Oregon residents to contact their state elected officials and reiterate the importance of this project to our region," said Port of Hood River (POHR) Commissioner Mike Fox, who also serves as Chair of the Bistate Working Group.
The New Bridge: Timeline, Improvements, and Tolls
The bridge project is currently in its fundraising and preliminary engineering stages, with final designs expected to be completed by 2024. Construction is estimated to between 2025 and 2026 and will take about five years to complete, with the bridge opening sometime in 2029 or 2030, and demolition and site restoration continuing on into 2032.
A bridge project timeline from the the Port of Hood River’s December 2022 report.
The new bridge will address issues such as river navigation, freight accommodation, seismic resiliency, a bike and pedestrian path, and environmental impacts from vehicle run-off.
The new bridge would sit just west of the current bridge site, near the park-and-ride on the Washington side, but without obstructing tribal fishing in the area.
An image taken from HoodRiverBridge.org.
An image taken from HoodRiverBridge.org.
Policy management for the new bridge will eventually be handed off by the POHR to the Hood River-White Salmon Bridge Authority, a newly formed government agency that has formed to oversee the new bridge design, construction, operations, maintenance and setting tolls once the new bridge is operating. and make policy decisions about tolls, and toll funds related to the new bridge.
Currently the Port of Hood River owns, operates, maintains, and sets toll policy for the existing bridge, and will continue to do so until the new bridge is complete.
The Bistate Working Group is workng as an intermediary on the project.
Historically the Port has used toll funds for bridge operations, repair, maintenance, and economic development projects such as the Hood River waterfront development project which supports 1,000 jobs. Some toll funds have also gone into a fund for replacement, but the fund is not large enough to cover replacement on its own.
HRWSBA’s toll policy plans are unknown at this time.
