The Missouri State Transportation Commission has given its approval to a request for the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) to streamline the process that will lead to construction of a new Mississippi River bridge at St. Louis .
Dave Nichols, MoDOT’s Director of Program Delivery, says the consultant selection process should be completed in the next few months, and another year or so before the design is completed. Construction will probably begin in 2010, with completion of the bridge and the connections on the Missouri and Illinois sides likely around 2014.
The streamlining allows MoDOT to begin the process of hiring the personnel necessary to complete the planning of the bridge. The project comes with a price tag of $640-million – $239-million from the federal government, $313-million from Illinois, and $88-million from Missouri.