By Donald Wittkowski
Motorists crossing over the 34th Street Bridge must navigate through a gauntlet of concrete construction barriers, narrow lanes, traffic lights and flashing road signs that bluntly warn them, “Be prepared to stop.”
This frustrating, patience-testing commute will continue until construction on the bridge’s $6.5 million redecking project is halted in May to avoid disrupting the surge of summer tourists into Ocean City, Cape May County engineer Dale Foster said Saturday at a meeting organized by Councilman Bob Barr.
In the meantime, the county is studying ways to change the project to ease some of the bottlenecks, Foster said. Commuters get stuck in backups as they squeeze through the single, alternating lanes of traffic and the temporary stop lights that have been placed on the bridge to accommodate construction.
“We’re ending up with long delays with the traffic signals,” Foster said while addressing a town meeting at the Ocean City Free Public Library attended by about 50 residents.
Foster reported that the first phase of the project was completed last week. Construction crews are expected to begin the second phase on Monday, and should wrap things up by late April if the weather cooperates. Both lanes of traffic over the bridge will be restored by May, just in time for the arrival of the summer tourists.
The 34th Street Bridge, built in 1964, is the most heavily traveled span owned by Cape May County and is a vital entryway into the south end of Ocean City along the Roosevelt Boulevard corridor. It is the second-busiest gateway into Ocean City, behind the state-owned Route 52 Causeway-Ninth Street Bridge in the center of town.
The bridge is 1,500 feet long and is made up of 31 spans. As part of its rehabilitation, 15 of those spans are being completely replaced. Construction crews will also refurbish the pockmarked and pitted concrete deck. Foster explained that the bridge’s steel reinforcing beams have become badly corroded by the salt air and must be overhauled.
The two-year facelift will be done in stages largely during the winter months of 2017 and 2018, with the entire project scheduled for completion by Memorial Day 2018. To minimize traffic disruptions, the lane restrictions caused by construction will be lifted during the busy summer months.
However, bridge traffic generally continues to be heavy even during the off-season, so commuters still feel the impacts during the winter. The bridge handles about 16,000 or 17,000 vehicles per day in the fall, winter and spring, compared to about 20,000 over the summer, Foster said.
Councilman Barr, who represents the Fourth Ward area, which includes the 34th Street Bridge, invited Foster and Cape May County Freeholder E. Marie Hayes to the town meeting Saturday to give an update on the construction project.
Barr urged Foster to find ways to reduce the delays that local commuters have to endure while crossing the bridge. Foster responded that the county is looking to “tweak” the project to ease the backups.
Construction is choreographed to keep the span open during the work, but traffic gets stacked up as cars are crammed through alternating, single lanes of traffic. Motorists must also wait for the stop lights to turn green.
Narrow walkways along the sides of the bridge allow pedestrians and bicyclists to cross the span, but put them right next to the motor vehicle traffic. The county considered building a new, wider walkway as part of the bridge’s rehabilitation, but that would have increased the construction cost from $6.5 million to $8 million, Foster said.
Still, the county has not given up on the possibility of finding other sources of funding to build a new walkway for pedestrians and bikers, Foster and Hayes stressed.
“I am going to push for something across that bridge. I am a bicyclist, I am a walker and I think it’s necessary,” Hayes, an Ocean City resident, told the audience.
Also during the meeting, Foster reported that work has been delayed on the replacement of another county-owned bridge in Ocean City, a tiny span on 17th Street that is used by an estimated 1,000 motorists per day during the peak summer months.
The 30-year-old bridge, made of aluminum and known for its large hump in the middle that limits traffic visibility on 17th Street, must be replaced because of serious rusting.
The county had hoped to complete the $2.2 million project by Memorial Day weekend, but Foster said it now appears construction crews will have to return in the fall to finish the job. Under the latest scenario, they will work on the bridge through the spring, suspend construction in the summer and then come back in the fall.
The project has been delayed because utility companies have been slow in removing the overhead electric, telephone and cable TV lines near the bridge, Foster said.
Although the 17th Street Bridge is just 19 feet long, it spans a navigable waterway and required extensive permitting for its reconstruction, including regulatory approval from the U.S. Coast Guard, Foster noted.
“It is a challenging job,” he said, referring to all of the permits.
