Drawbridge replacement raises questions
Navigation district must OK plan for Pelican Island span, but doing so could mean its end
GALVESTON — The Pelican Island Bridge is not much to look at.
It’s neither majestic like suspension bridges that accentuate the skylines of New York City and San Francisco nor is it particularly utilitarian — it does not support pedestrians or cyclsts seeking to take in the panoramic views of Galveston Bay.
To drivers crossing the bridge from Galveston Island over the Galveston Ship Channel, its only notable feature is a box-like booth on the north side. There, a worker from Galveston County Navigation District No. 1 operates the lift, allowing vessels large and small unobstructed access to and from the Port of Galveston.
The booth, like its owner, is a vestige of a previous era, long before bascule bridges became automated and long before the city limits of Galveston extended beyond 103rd Street on the island’s West End.
The booth is also representative of one of the last remaining obstacles to replacing the aging, nearly 60-year-old drawbridge with a more modern span that could eventually have a rail component and usher in the longawaited development on Pelican
Island.
Whether to replace the bridge with a $217 million land bridge or a $91 million automated drawbridge is set to be considered Friday by Galveston County officials, who seemed to balk in discussions earlier this month at the higher cost of the land bridge.
Any resolution, however, will require approval from the Galveston Navigation District, which owns the current drawbridge — an approval that could put the district out of business. With no employee to raise the bridge, the district has no need to exist, officials said.
“They’re a small district with a really limited tax base and they can’t afford to take on something that they can’t financially manage,” said Galveston Mayor Jim Yarborough. “We’re trying to figure out what their share should be, what can they handle within their existing organization and piece it together.”
Expensive options
One of the only bridges of its kind in Texas, the Pelican Island Bridge was built in 1959 at a time when few bascule bridges were constructed.
Today, the bridge averages around 9,100 cars per day, most of them commuters to the Texas A&M University at Galveston campus on Pelican Island. Besides the university and Seawolf Park, most of the island is undeveloped, with only a single major road running across the island.
The island has been seen as fertile ground for economic development for years, seemingly contingent on adding rail infrastructure to attract more businesses. The $217 million proposal would include a land bridge that would be able to carry a rail line; the cheaper drawbridge would not.
“If we’re going to build a new bridge it needs to have a rail component because a new vehicular bridge doesn’t do anything for development on Pelican Island,” said Darrell Apffel, a Galveston County commissioner for Precinct 1, which includes Pelican Island. “So I’ve tried to find a way to come up with a rail component, which I believe all the other commissioners and the judge felt the same way.”
The navigation district is run by three elected commissioners that serve six-year terms, as well as a chairman, currently Frank Incaprera.
A relatively small public entity, the district was created when the bridge was built with the sole purpose of owning and operating the drawbridge, which uses a beam or truss deck that can be raised to an incline or vertical position, allowing vessels to pass underneath.
When the district was created, it adopted its geographic boundaries at the old city limits for Galveston, which only went to 103rd street, where the Galveston seawall ends. As a result, the district cannot collect taxes from the island’s affluent West End extending to Jamaica Beach — or roughly onethird of Galveston’s population.
And therein lies the dilemma for the district: Should it pony up millions of dollars to add to the local share for a $91 million bridge that won’t require manpower, on top of the $10 million it will have to pay to demolish the current bridge?
“We have people that are lifting the bridge every day, so we have to have a payroll for that,” Incaprera said. “We still collect taxes and the greatest percentage of the people that belong to the navigation district and pay taxes to the navigation district don’t feel like a small entity like this really should participate in a new bridge. If the county is going to build a new bridge, you don’t need anybody to watch it.”
The Texas Department of Transportation has committed $45 million to a replacement, contingent on an agreement with the navigation district that would need to be signed by the end of June. The remaining money, whether for a land bridge or the conventional 75-foot bridge, would come from a combination of the city of Galveston, Galveston County, Texas A&M and the Houston-Galveston Area Council, as well as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Yarborough said the city is willing to pay up to $5 million toward the project. HGAC would provide another $8 million. Texas A&M and the county have not yet put forth a firm funding commitment.
Ongoing upkeep
During a Galveston County Commissioners Court workshop on April 23, County Engineer Michael Shannon indicated that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was not receptive to the land bridge and its $217 million cost. Environmentalists have also lobbied against the land bridge because of the impact it could have on wildlife and the overall health of Galveston Bay.
Shannon said based on conversations with the various stakeholders, the $91 million bridge alternative has a funding shortfall of about $10 million to $15 million. He added that the lack of funding commitments is partly a result of the indecision on a firm proposal for the bridge design.
“Other agencies don’t want to commit to a project where they don’t know what it is,” Shannon said.
Galveston County Judge Mark Henry said the commissioners are expected to select a final bridge proposal in a special meeting Friday. But even if the county settles on a replacement model — and all stakeholders agree that the bridge has outlived its expected lifespan — the navigation district has not yet indicated a willingness to participate.
For Incaprera and the navigation district, participating in the local share of the bridge replacement project raises significant questions, both existential and practical. He said the district would be solely responsible for picking up the tab for demolition, which is already higher than any other local agency has been willing to contribute. And once the bridge is demolished, the navigation district would be effectively obsolete, he said.
“We may not choose to help out,” Incaprera said. “We’re not a fat collection agency. I think we’ve done a good job with what we have done. We’ve kept that bridge operating for over 50 years and we’re still working on it right now.”
The navigation district is also spending significant amounts of money just to maintain the current bridge — up to $2 million recently for electrical work.
TxDOT is also contributing toward structural maintenance, and has indicated that these repairs will prop up the bridge for another 10 years.
The timeline creates an additional sense of urgency to get the permitting process started on a replacement model, with the goal of starting construction by 2020.
“I haven’t ever seen a TxDOT and a Corps of Engineers project ever go on schedule and I’ve been doing this 30 years,” Yarborough said. “So you know it’s not going to be finished in 2023; so you’re going to be pushing 2025. That’s cutting it close to the life of that bridge in 2027, so something’s got to be done quick.”
TxDOT takeover?
One possible solution that Yarborough and others have suggested is for TxDOT to take ownership of the bridge, effectively taking it out of the hands of the navigation district. The state agency has several roads and facilities on Galveston Island that it currently maintains.
In recent “casual conversations” with TxDOT, Yarborough said he floated a swap proposal in which the city would agree to maintain several roads in Galveston in exchange for the agency taking over operations and management of the bridge, potentially opening up more funding opportunities from the state.
TxDOT did not respond to a request for comment on bringing the bridge into its system.
Incaprera said that the navigation district has yet to make a determination on whether it would help fund a replacement, but he seemed almost resigned to the fact that the district may have outlived its usefulness.
“My personal opinion is that someday when this bridge is torn down, we’re going to have to spend $10 million or more to tear this old bridge down and when that’s done, that’s done,” Incaprera said. “The navigation district will go fishing.”