Resilience and Collaboration

By Marianne Brinson and William Jeffries, Jr., Contributing Authors

The Howard Frankland Bridge, connecting Pinellas County to Tampa across the Old Tampa Bay, is the most traveled, and arguably most congested, bridge in this region of Florida.

Originally built as a low-level concrete trestle, the Howard Frankland bridge was conceived and built in the 1950s with just four lanes along with dredged causeways at either end. A low center concrete divider separated oncoming traffic with no emergency lanes, creating difficult driving conditions until a raised concrete wall divider was installed.

To provide additional capacity, a second parallel four-lane bridge span opened in 1991 to carry all southbound traffic, leaving northbound traffic on the original structure, thereby improving safety for all.

The original bridge, now well past its design life, and the newer 1990s bridge system handles an average of 139,000 vehicles daily. Those numbers are expected to increase significantly as the population on each side of the bay continues to rise.

As part of the Florida Department of Transportation’s (FDOT) historic multi-billion-dollar Tampa Bay Next program, the Howard Frankland Bridge modernization project, began in 2020. The first of three primary steps was to build a new eight lane bridge (four general purpose, two tolled express in each direction) as well as a bike/pedestrian path. The second upgraded the existing southbound bridge, and the third removed the original northbound bridge.

Work over the last few years has largely focused on constructing the new modern and resilient bridge, which opened to traffic in March, on schedule and on budget, despite some potentially time and cost busting incidents.

A Bridge in Transition

The new Howard Frankland bridge is 168 feet wide — nearly three times the width of the southbound bridge and the largest, by surface area, bridge in Florida.

The new design improves incident management in emergency response situations and provides additional capacity along a critical evacuation route while also more resilient from hurricane damage. A portion of the new bridge was constructed to hold additional weight and can accommodate potential future transit, up to a light rail transit system.

FDOT procured the design-build project with Archer Western/Traylor Bros Joint Venture as its prime contractor and AtkinsRéalis as the Construction, Engineering, and Inspection (CEI) consultant, the largest CEI contract for the firm in North America.

Coordinating the large workforce, materials and equipment required for a project of this magnitude has been complex. The project required a total of 3,014 piles, 1,726 bridge beams, 23,100 tons of rebar and over 150,000 cubic yards of concrete. From the project’s onset, the collaborative relationship between FDOT, the JV team and AtkinsRéalis has been crucial to solving problems and keeping the project on track.

A Cause(way) Connection

The level of hands-on involvement and real-time collaboration speaks to the partnership that has been key to the project's success. Late night calls to visit the site or talk through an issue were not unusual.

During Hurricane Ian in 2022, the Sanibel causeway in southwest Florida collapsed as all the backfill from the Mechanically Stabilized Earth (MSE) walls washed out during the high storm surge.

Coincidentally, the project team was preparing to install MSE walls for the new Howard Frankland bridge project. Realizing the threat of future storms, FDOT put a hold on installation in order to redesign MSE wall materials to weather future storms.

The original design was re-evaluated. Working closely with FDOT District Geotechnical Materials Engineer Kisan Patel, P.E., new bridge MSE walls for greater resilience were adapted. Subsequently, the backfill materials were re-specified to 57 stone aggregate up to 1 foot above the 100-year high water level.

It was a decision that could have delayed the project. Instead, the team worked together to keep the project moving forward.

In this case, the contractor extended its existing concrete conveyor system to the far side of the bridge, allowing crews to continue with concrete pours while MSE wall redesign was completed.

As a result, the contractor didn’t need to submit a delay claim, and FDOT only had to pay for material adjustment to the new design. The upgraded MSE walls were installed by 2023, a fortuitous adjustment as the region was hit by two more hurricanes in 2024, Hurricanes Helene and Milton.

While the existing bridges were closed during the storms due to storm surge, the new MSE walls remained 100% intact, suffering no damage.

In another example of close collaboration, the project team made the approximately 1.5-mile-long causeways on either side of the bridges, and bridge infrastructure such as the Intelligent Traffic System cameras and communication systems, less susceptible to damage during storms.

The project team repositioned those systems above anticipated high-water levels – again with no impact to the schedule and budget.

Execution and Next Steps

The entire Howard Frankland Bridge modernization project is on schedule for completion by spring 2026. Already, this year, the project team opened four (of the eight) general use lanes on the new bridge.

Southbound bridge traffic was shifted to the new bridge so that crews could complete necessary rehabilitation on that roadway — a task that will take three to four months.

Once both bridges are open and traffic is shifted to its final alignment, the original northbound/eastbound bridge will be demolished, beginning this summer.

“With I-275 as a vital corridor for daily commuters, the opening of this new bridge has been highly anticipated by the local community,” said FDOT District Seven Secretary David Gwynn, P.E. “Nearly 200,000 residents and visitors depend on this route daily, as well as in great times of need as it is a crucial evacuation route in the area.”

The new Howard Frankland Bridge will reduce travel times for commuters driving between St. Petersburg and Tampa. The bridge also will support current and future multimodal transit options, as well as the addition of pedestrian and bicycle pathways.

The ensuing phase of FDOT’s Tampa Bay Next program will be the I-275 Pinellas Corridor widening project. This extends about 7.5 miles along the interstate from 38th Ave. N to 4th St. N. in Pinellas County and will pick up to the south of where the Howard Frankland bridge project ends.

This design-bid-build procurement is expected to improve existing traffic congestion, enhance safety and better accommodate future travel demands associated with projected population and employment growth.

The new project is scheduled to start construction around July or August of this year. Notably, this latest project will mark over 12 years of continuous work between AtkinsRéalis and FDOT on the I-275 corridor. RB

Marianne Brinson, P.E., is a senior project engineer at AtkinsRéalis and William Jeffries, Jr. is a construction manager at AtkinsRéalis.