Repairs to Veterans Memorial Bridge connecting Columbia and Wrightsville will require 3-year closure

• By Chris Reber/LNP | LancasterOnline

The Veterans Memorial Bridge connecting Columbia and Wrightsville will close for three years during a renovation project that is now expected to cost $234 million, nearly three times its original budget.

Officials from both boroughs worry about the impact the project will have on traffic and their economies. The 1.2-mile bridge carries state Route 462 over the Susquehanna River between Lancaster and York counties.

The state Department of Transportation on Friday said the five-year project will begin in 2027. The three-year closure, set for sometime in the middle of the project, is required so a contractor can remove and replace the entire deck, barriers, and horizontal support beams of the bridge. Only the arches and vertical piers of the existing bridge will remain in place. PennDOT originally planned to keep the existing bridge deck and build a new one on top of it.

“The Department anticipates the bridge will be closed approximately three years to all traffic modes and is actively considering all measures that minimize the closure duration,” PennDOT spokesperson Dave Thompson wrote in an email on Friday.

PennDOT plans to hold a meeting to update the public on the bridge project sometime next month. It has not determined a date or location.

Thompson also confirmed that the estimated cost of the project has risen to $234 million, including construction, design, utilities and right-of-way acquisition. The project was originally estimated to cost $79 million, but PennDOT has since nearly tripled the amount of material that it plans to remove and replace on the 94-year-old bridge.

Major disruption

Columbia and Wrightsville have been preparing for the bridge to close. While PennDOT has not announced the exact date, officials from both boroughs expect it will be a major disruption.

Columbia Mayor Leo Lutz said residents cross the bridge to go to work and shop, and emergency services rely on it for the quickest route between the two boroughs.

“It’s going to have an impact on Columbia and Wrightsville from a safety standpoint and a commerce standpoint,” Lutz said.

Eric White, Wrightsville Borough councilman, said he expects that with the closure of the bridge, through traffic on Route 462 will decrease. He said the bridge is used not only by cars but people on foot and bikes.

“We’re going to be like a cul-de-sac,” he said. “That’s a lot of people every day who come through here.”

The bridge sees 10,000 vehicles per day, according to PennDOT data. The neighboring Wrights Ferry Bridge, which carries Route 30 over the Susquehanna River, sees 52,000 vehicles per day.

When there is a crash on the Wrights Ferry bridge, the Veterans Memorial Bridge is the main detour. During a recently completed $5 million maintenance project on the Wrights Ferry Bridge, PennDOT added a gate in the median for use when a crash closes one side of the bridge. Emergency crews could use the gate to temporarily switch one side of the bridge to two-way traffic.

Renovations to the Veterans Memorial bridge have been in the works since 2017. PennDOT originally proposed rehabilitating the bridge and keeping the existing deck. Work was scheduled to begin this year, but in early 2023, inspectors discovered cracking and deterioration that was more serious than previously thought, and delayed the project.

Following that inspection, PennDOT placed a 10-ton weight restriction on the bridge. PennDOT says that the bridge remains safe for vehicles, and the restriction is meant to prevent further deterioration while it plans repairs.

White said he doesn’t look forward to the disruption, but sees the bridge as a vital connection between the two boroughs that must be maintained for years to come.

“My biggest concern is that they would say say, ‘it costs too much, we’re going to close it.’” he said. “That would be a disaster.”