In one of its most high-profile infrastructure grant announcements, the US Department of Transportation has awarded $5 billion to projects to rebuild, repair and restore 13 large and critically important bridges from coast to coast.
The grants are funded by the Jobs and Infrastructure Investment Act’s Bridge Investment Program and will go to projects in 16 states. In total, the program contains $40 billion over five years. The latest awards are Large Bridge Grants, a subset of the Bridge Investment Program.
In a July 16 briefing for reporters, DOT Secretary Pete Buttigieg said, “These bridges affect entire regions and ultimately affect the entire U.S. economy.” Buttigieg added: “And what they all have in common is that their condition means they need significant and urgent investment to help keep people safe and keep our supply chains growing smoothly.”
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The group’s largest grant is $1.4 billion to the Oregon Department of Transportation, for a project to replace two vertical lift bridges that carry Interstate-5 over the Columbia River and connect Portland, Oregon, to Vancouver, Washington . The project also won a $600 million grant in January through the DOT’s Mega Grant Program.
The second largest award in the new round of bridge grants is $993 million to the Massachusetts DOT for the planned replacement of the Sagamore Bridge on Cape Cod. This project also received a $372 million Mega grant in early January.
Third among the awards is $550 million to the Alabama DOT, to replace the Mobile River Bridge and the Bayway Multimodal Project.
Next in size is a grant to the Pennsylvania DOT, which will receive $500 million to replace the I-83 South Bridge in Harrisburg.
Also among the top honorees is the Tennessee DOT, which is getting $394 million for the America’s River Crossing project, which will replace the 75-year-old I-55 bridge that spans the Mississippi River between Memphis, Tenn., and West Memphis, Ark. .
As with other DOT discretionary grant programs, large bridge program funds were in high demand. Shailen Bhatt, head of the DOT’s Federal Highway Administration, said the agency received 33 eligible applications, seeking a total of nearly $10 billion, in the latest round.
The Large Bridges Program is open to projects whose total costs exceed $100 million.
The minimum grant is $50 million. The maximum grant is 50% of the eligible costs of the project. According to the FHWA, priority is given to projects that are ready for construction.
More broadly, Buttigieg also said that through IIJA’s various bridge programs, more than 10,200 projects are underway, “and counting.”
The US DOT announced the new awards on July 17. But the governors and members of the congressional delegations of the states where the winning projects are located received earlier notifications about the grants and broke the news several days before the US DOT did.
