Purcell-Lexington bridge to open Friday
PURCELL—If Oklahomans hear a bunch of hooting and hollering Friday morning, it's probably coming from residents of Purcell and Lexington.
After nearly six years of frustration, a new fourlane bridge linking the two cities officially will be declared open to traffic.
“It's huge,” Lexington City Manager Chris Coker said of the impact of having a fully open bridge once again link the two communities. “We have a lot of elderly and all their medical care is over there, grocery stores and things like that. It is definitely a lifeline for some of these folks.”
A ribbon cutting ceremony to mark the occasion is scheduled for 9 a.m. Friday near the center of bridge, which spans the Canadian River and BNSF railroad on US-77/SH-39.
Lexington Mayor David Adams and Purcell Mayor James “Ted” Cox are expected to address the crowd. Also speaking will be Tim Gatz, executive director of the Oklahoma Department of Transportation.
Slated to join them is former Purcell Mayor Ron Fishburn, who was present as a 5- year- old in 1938 when the previous bridge linking the two communities was dedicated. Fishburn plans to talk about the history of the bridge and its significance to the two cities.
Getting back and forth between the two communities has been a bit of an adventure since early 2014 when a bridge rehabilitation project went awry.
Welds that were intended to strengthen the old, two-lane bridge instead caused cracks to form, creating significant safety issues.
Inspectors ordered the nearly 80-year-old bridge closed and what was normally a two-minute jaunt between the two cities suddenly became a 45-minute road trip.
The public outcry was enormous. About 10,000 vehicles a day used the bridge, so its closure was more than a minor inconvenience.
State transportation officials pulled out all stops to fix the problem.
First they spent $22 million making temporary repairs to the old bridge, while plans for a new replacement bridge were put on fast track.
With temporary repairs in place, the old bridge was able to reopen in four months, albeit with a 36-ton weight limit.
Meanwhile, state transportation officials rushed to get a new bridge built, simultaneously doing environmental and design work so that a process that normally take sat least seven or eight years could be completed in less than six.
Webber LL C of The Woodlands, Texas, was awarded a contract to build the bridge. The contract i ncluded up t o $ 2 million in incentives for early completion, s ai d Cody Boyd, a spokesman for the Oklahoma Department of Transportation. The contractor has earned at least some of those incentives, although the amount has not been calculated yet, Boyd said.
The c os t of t he new bridge is about $38 million, officials said.
The first two lanes of the new bridge were completed about a year ago and traffic was rerouted to them while the old bridge was torn down and replaced with the remaining two lanes of the new bridge.
I n addition t o having four lanes, the new bridge i ncludes a sidewalk f or pedestrians.