6/19/2009

Stillwater Bridge Update


The Sierra Club's lawsuit against the US DOT, the Federal Highway Administration, the US Department of Interior and the National Park Service is finally scheduled for oral arguments on August 28.

The Sieraa Club's primary contention of this lawsuit is that the National Park Service overturned their objection to the proposed bridge design without any substantive evidence. Their original NPS findings were that the bridge design will, in fact, cause significant impact to the riverway without any plans for mitigating those impacts.

It is important to again note - contrary to what has been voiced by some politicians - that the Sierra Club's lawsuit HAS NOT been the impediment to the bridge being constructed for the last few years. The real impediment is that there has been no funds provided by the Minnesota legislature to support this project.

The Minnesota portion of the proposed new bridge design is now estimated to approach $400 million. With the projected environmental impacts and the skyrocketing price tag, the Sierra Club has continued to believe the design of the bridge should be revisited to find alternative designs which would have less impact and a lower cost to taxpayers.

$400 million today = $295 M in 1999 = $217 M in 1989 = $169 M in 1979 = $188 M in 1969

2 comments:

Aslag said...

I must say, they seem to have gotten quite a bit ahead of themselves here. What exactly is the reason for this bridge?

It seems to me that they could construct a less damaging sort of bridge in place of the one they so hastily put up.

Sunny B. said...

The Sierra Club has an interesting about the funding not actually being available for the construction of a new Stillwater bridge. With Minnesota, Wisconsin and the Feds all kicking in money, all three need to be onboard at the same.

It doesn't make sense to me to build a bridge in downtown Stillwater. built it to the south, remove the old bridge and enjoy the serenity that would then exist in the part along Stillwater's river front.