Florida's 60-year-old Cape Coral Bridge will begin the rebuilding process in 2026, with the Midpoint Bridge beginning after.
At the Cape Coral event Catch The Vision on Monday, Lee County Commissioner Kevin Ruane said, "It's a long process" when describing the steps the county needs to take before work can start on the Cape Coral bridges.
"I know that's not what people want to hear," Ruane said. "We have to go through a planning, a design, and an environmental study to procure the money necessary to build a bridge."
Ruane said the studies will be done in 2024, with construction starting in 2026.
He said it would take two years to go through the procurement process, secure funds, and go out for proposal requests before the work could start.
"One of the reasons this is taking as long as it is, is we're trying to go through and secure both state and federal funding," he said.
The Cape Coral Bridge Project will expand the bridge from four to six lanes — three in each direction; include drainage ponds under the bridge, remove the toll plaza to replace it with electronic tolls, and incorporate a pedestrian bridge.
It's aimed at addressing the age of the bridge while adding capacity to the roadway, improving traffic operations, adding multimodal facilities, and enhancing safety for roadway users.
A new pedestrian bridge is going on the east side of the existing billboard on Cape Coral Parkway. It will allow pedestrian access from the Cape Coral side of the Caloosahatchee River to make it possible for pedestrians to cross the six lanes of Cape Coral Parkway at street level.
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Source: Yahoo! News
