The One Percent Sales Tax Commission voted to supplement funding the city of Jackson received for a project to demolish and replace the bridge on Colonial Circle.
The bridge has been closed since April 2021 due to deterioration.
The city received the most recent round of bids to demolish and replace the bridge on Jan. 10 and those came in at about $625,000, said Pete Perry, a member of the commission.
The city has $584,744 from the 2022 Emergency Road and Bridge Repair Funds for the project and asked the commission during its Jan. 11 meeting to provide the remainder, about $40,250, for the project. The commission also approved at its Jan. 11 meeting funding a similar bridge project on McRaven Road in south Jackson.
The Jackson City Council is expected to vote on the bid for the project at its Jan. 31 meeting, according to Robert Lee, city engineer.
The project has taken a step forward and then one backward.
In April 2022, the city accepted bids to demolish and replace the Colonial Circle bridge, but the bids expired before funding was awarded, Lee said.
The council authorized the mayor on Sept. 13, 2022 to sign a memorandum of agreement with the Mississippi Transportation Commission about the project and named Elmore Moody as the engineer of record for it.
During its July 12, 2022 meeting, the council approved up to $584,744 from the 2022 Emergency Road and Bridge Repair Funds for the project.
When can residents who live on Colonial Circle and near there expect the bridge to be replaced?
The short answer is: It could take a while if the project follows the history of another bridge replacement in Jackson.
Ken Wilson, president of the Ridgewood Park Neighborhood Association, is ready for construction to get started.
“It’s past time for that bridge to reopen,” he said. “Two years is a long time for it to be closed.”
The closure of the bridge has meant additional vehicles, even some 18 wheelers, on Plantation Boulevard, he said. “It’s brought a lot of traffic and a lot of speeders,” he said.
Drivers on Colonial Circle/Adkins Boulevard between Ridgewood Road and Old Canton Road will need to continue using alternate routes to bypass the closed bridge.
A bridge over Eubanks Creek in the 300 block of Hawthorn Drive in the Fondren neighborhood reopened in May after being closed for 50 months for reconstruction.
That bridge was shut down to traffic in April 2018 after the Mississippi Office of State Aid Road Construction directed the city to do so because it had structural issues. Construction did not start for about three years because of a lack of funds for the project and rain and other issues delayed construction.
When the Hawthorn Drive bridge was torn out in June 2021, residents were told it would be a three-month project to replace it, but construction soon stopped.
The project came to a halt after Entergy drained Lake Hico, which is located off West Northside Drive, at the request of the Jackson Public School District. The lake, which was used to provide water for the nearby Rex Brown power plant that is now closed, feeds into Eubanks Creek.
Construction didn’t pick back up until October 2021.
The commission provided $478,353.40 for the Hawthorn Drive bridge replacement, which cost about $528,000. The city received $50,000 in BP settlement funds to help with the construction.
