Benton County seeks plan for bridge repair
Goal to restore War Eagle crossing
BENTONVILLE — Benton County is advertising nationally for an engineering firm to design a program to rehabilitate the historic War Eagle Bridge.
The county sent out a request for qualifications May 13 and will close the submission period June 3. Bob Clinard, county judge of Benton County, said he’s fielded some calls and questions about the project.
The county is working to determine what, if any, state and federal laws and regulations may govern the process of rehabilitating the bridge, Clinard said. The county has applied for federal grant money, which will require a set of engineering plans before any money is awarded. Beyond that, the county needs to know what kind of work and how much work is possible, he said.
“I’ve got to find out what the rules are before we kick off this game,” he said.
Robert Scoggin with the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department said work on historic bridges is limited by the nature of the structure. Engineering for a bridge as old as the War Eagle Bridge will require a specific set of skills, he said.
“It’s a specialty field,” he said. “These historic bridges were put together using methods that are no longer in use for the most part. You’re not going to find someone who’s just graduated from the University of Arkansas engineering school who’s familiar with those methods. They don’t teach them.”
The county and state dealt with similar issues when the Fisher Ford and Colonel Meyers bridges were being considered for restoration or replacement, Scoggin said. The county will have to go through a specific process because of the historic designation of the structure. For those two Benton County bridges, the state went through a marketing process, trying to find someone to take ownership of the bridges and responsibility for the ongoing maintenance, he said. In both cases, the bridges were removed and replaced, he said.
Any restoration of the War Eagle Bridge would be a limited project, Scoggin said. The bridge will never meet modern standards without losing its designation as a historic bridge, he said.
“If you significantly degrade the historical integrity of the bridge, it will no longer be eligible for National Historic Register status,” he said. “If you were to rehab the bridge, you might get it up to a certain level, maybe the level it was when it was built. That’s what you want.”
Jenny Harmon, a resident of the War Eagle area, has spoken with Clinard and put him in touch with the Historic Bridge Foundation in Austin, Texas. Clinard confirmed he has spoken with Kitty Henderson, executive director of the foundation, and is willing to work with the group to preserve the bridge.