Work on the Hell Canyon Bridge replacement project is really moving along…

As you can see in the video above, crews are placing girders for the new, wider bridge set to replace the 1950s-era bridge that drivers use today.

The work is all part of a $14.4 million improvement project that includes the construction of the new bridge (it’ll be a four-span steel-plate girder bridge), the eventual removal of the old bridge and some additional road construction/realignment work to the north and south of the new bridge.

The new 665-foot-long two-lane bridge will feature wider travel lanes and will be approximately 47 feet wide, more than 17 feet wider than the current bridge. The bridge will also accommodate heavier loads, making it more convenient for commercial trucks to carry goods and produce to their final destinations.

This project animation gives a good look at what to expect as the work progresses. See some recent photos of the project on our Flickr page.

By Dustin Krugel
ADOT Office of Public Information

Residents will have a more reliable link with Yuma County’s largest employer, Yuma Proving Ground, thanks to a 600-foot bridge ADOT is building across a flood-prone section of US 95.

Work began earlier this month on the $9.3 million bridge spanning Fortuna Wash northeast of Yuma and is expected to be completed by next winter.

In addition to being a key trade route between the U.S. and Mexico, US 95 near Yuma sees increased demand during the winter months from agricultural workers and seasonal visitors. The highway currently passes through the wash, which sees flash flooding that forces closures.

“Building a bridge over Fortuna Wash is a critical safety project for the Yuma County region, the Yuma Proving Ground and the agricultural industry,” said ADOT Southwest District Engineer Paul Patane. “Motorists rely on this roadway every day to travel between Yuma and Interstate 10, and flash flooding at Fortuna Wash has previously closed the only north-south corridor in the region, forcing motorists to take lengthy detours. This new bridge will be a huge benefit to the region.”

The bridge, partially funded through a $3.2 million federal grant ADOT received in 2011, is going in at milepost 34, approximately 12 miles northeast of Yuma and 10 miles south of the turnoff (Imperial Dam Road) to Yuma Proving Ground.

Yuma Proving Ground, a U.S. Army facility with more than 3,000 military and civilian employees, is one of the largest military installations in the world and home to General Motors’ hot-weather vehicle test facility. It has an economic impact of more than $430 million annually.

“I personally have waited many hours on Highway 95 over the years because Fortuna Wash floodwaters flowed over the road,” said Chuck Wullenjohn, public affairs officer at Yuma Proving Ground. “The new bridge will be a boon both for commuters and for YPG cargo shipments that will no longer face being impeded by a flowing wash.”

ADOT’s long-term goal is widening about 15 miles of US 95 between Avenue 9E to Aberdeen Road, but that project would first need to be funded. The Fortuna Wash bridge will be built to accommodate four lanes of traffic but initially striped for two lanes with center-turn lane.

Crews are scheduled to work on the Fortuna Wash bridge project during weekdays between 6 a.m. and 4 p.m. Initial work will include setting up a temporary detour road and tree removals, while actual bridge construction is expected to begin in March.

Motorists should allow extra travel time as lane restrictions will be in place and flaggers will occasionally need to alternate traffic through the work zone.

ADOT works to inform the public about planned highway restrictions, but there is a possibility that unscheduled closures or restrictions may occur. Weather can also affect a project schedule. To stay up to date with the latest highway conditions around the state, visit the ADOT Traveler Information Center at az511.gov or call 511.

Cooperation and partnerships are important on any big project, but maybe even more so on one like the I-15 Virgin River Bridge No. 6 rehabilitation.

The site’s remote location and the fact that there are limited alternative routes make collaboration crucial.

“ADOT tries to meet with local government and emergency responders on every project and talk about emergency access plans,” says ADOT engineer Adam Carreon. “Everybody knows what’s happening, everybody knows what our options are. We plan for any event and when something happens we all know what we’re doing.”

That planning paid off recently...

As you can see in the video above, the driver of a truck pulling a set of triple trailers through the work zone lost control of the third trailer – it tipped and fell against the median wall. After the driver pulled over, two of the trailers were still blocking the highway.

The ensuing coordination between the Department of Public Safety, ADOT and the contractor got traffic moving quickly and ultimately saved drivers from delays of about three hours.

Learn more on why partnering is valuable by checking out these previous posts. You can also find project details on our blog.

If you have travel plans next Tuesday night/Wednesday morning that involve westbound Interstate 10 between Tucson and Benson, you’ll want to pay close attention…

A bridge replacement project is going to require the closure of all westbound lanes from 9 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 17 to 5 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 18, which means drivers headed in that direction will face a 67-mile detour that’ll add up to two additional hours of travel time to their trip. If possible, travelers should consider avoiding the stretch.

Eastbound I-10 will remain open.

This is the first of six planned closures to allow crews to replace the bridge at Davidson Canyon, between State Route 83 east of Tucson (Exit 281) and State Route 90 west of Benson (Exit 302). The six full westbound closures are needed to allow crews to set girders and pour new bridge decks. The project is replacing a bridge built in 1961 near milepost 285.

The bridge replacement is part of the I-10 Quad Project, a combination of four separate transportation improvement projects that includes removing and replacing pavement in three segments of I-10 and replacing the westbound I-10 bridge through Davidson Canyon, located approximately 20 miles east of downtown Tucson.

What drivers should expect
Detour signs will guide westbound I-10 motorists south on SR 90 (Exit 302), west on SR 82 to Sonoita and north on SR 83 to reconnect with I-10 at Exit 281 (see map above). ADOT will provide advance notice of subsequent closures, which will all be overnight and will not affect weekend or holiday travel.

Drivers are advised to proceed through the work zone with caution, slow down and be alert for construction equipment and personnel.

Surrounded by spectacular scenery, the Navajo Bridge is a structure we think is actually quite stunning itself.

Don’t you agree?

Located on US 89A in northern Arizona’s Marble Canyon, the bridge spans the Colorado River and has an interesting history…

As you can see in the photograph above (top left), construction of the bridge was underway in 1928; however, plans for the bridge were in the works even before that.

According to the Arizona Historic Bridge Inventory, the Arizona Highway Department started planning for a bridge over the Colorado River near Lees Ferry in 1923 and by the next year, preliminary surveys had been completed. Construction began in April 1928 after the Arizona Highway Department contracted with the Kansas City Structural Steel Company to fabricate and construct the bridge.

Wondering what it cost to build a structure of this size 87 years ago? The state of Arizona paid $290,000, and $100,000 was provided by the Navajo Tribal Fund – a bargain compared to today’s costs!

The bridge’s completion in 1929 was quite a significant event for Arizona, something that’s noted in the Historic Bridge Inventory:

“After the highway linking it with Flagstaff was completed two years later, (the Navajo Bridge) played a pivotal role in the development of a vast region that covered two states. As the only crossing of the Colorado River for some 600 miles, the bridge has had a profound impact on the commerce and transportation of a rugged and remote part of Arizona. Its construction opened the state from the north, providing a valuable tourist route to Grand Canyon National Park and the rest of the state.”

The Navajo Bridge still stands today, but you cannot drive across it. In use until the recent construction of an adjacent span that now carries highway traffic (the new bridge is in the background of the top right photo), the original Navajo Bridge now functions a pedestrian bridge.

We love featuring vintage transportation-related photographs on this blog, but we also like to focus on how things have improved and changed over the years. That’s why we thought it’d be fun to compare the old to the new in a series we’re calling, “Yesterday and Today.”

With hundreds of blog posts in our archives, we understand if you haven’t had a chance to read them all.

However, there’s a lot of interesting content in those early posts and we don’t want you to miss out. That’s why we’re looking back and highlighting some of our favorites in a series called, “From the Rearview Mirror.”

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Originally published on Oct. 21, 2011, this blog post highlights something that most people don’t get to see every day – a bridge’s substructure. In the post and accompanying video, you’ll learn all about caissons and how they give bridges strength. The video also gives a close-up look at how caissons are built and put into place – an interesting process to see.

Bridges are a favorite topic here on the ADOT Blog and in the years since this post was first published, we’ve continued to blog about the structures. If you’d like to learn more, revisit some of our previous bridge blog posts after you’re done learning about caissons.

Building a Freeway: Massive underground caissons give bridges strength

You know when you drive under or over a freeway bridge that it’s a massive structure...

There are the two abutments (the upright supporting structures at each end that carries the load of the bridge span), there are usually center columns or piers, and, of course, the girders and the bridge deck (the part you actually drive across).

The girders and the deck make up the bridge’s superstructure. (You can tell how much goes into a bridge’s superstructure by checking out what goes into taking one down.)

But what you don’t see is that buried beneath the bridge is part of the equally impressive substructure formed by rows of caissons – massive steel-and-concrete pillars that support and lock in place the abutments.

The substructure, which is made up of the caissons and the abutments, ensures that the bridge is secure and strong enough to support not only its own weight, but also the weight of all the vehicles that drive across it every day.

The caissons are formed by tying thousands of feet of rebar into massive steel cages that are then lifted with a crane, lowered into drilled shafts, and filled with concrete. Several feet of rebar is left rising out of the ground, which is what the abutments are ultimately secured to.

There’s no such thing as a “standard size” caisson…their lengths and diameters vary from project to project and bridge to bridge based on several factors, including the soil type and the expected and actual weights the bridge must support.

Generally speaking, caissons for most bridges in Arizona are between 40 and 120 feet deep and 5 to 12 feet in diameter.

There’s also no set number for how many caissons each abutment will require – that, too, varies by bridge.

Take the three bridges being constructed for the new phase of Loop 303 in Surprise, for example. The bridge abutments at Waddell and Cactus roads are supported by 23 caissons each (46 total per bridge), while the bridge at Greenway Road, which is only partially elevated over Loop 303, requires just 20 total caissons (10 under each abutment).

The video above shows the fabrication and installation of those Loop 303 caissons. The steel cages for these particular caissons are 95-feet long and weigh about 20,000 pounds. The cages were lowered into 88-feet-deep drilled shafts and filled with 80 cubic yards (eight truckloads) of concrete each.

If you’re keeping tally … that’s eight truckloads for each caisson, times 106 caissons, for a total of 848 cement truckloads (for just those three bridges)…and that is just part of the substructure!

The concrete for these caissons cures in about 24 hours, clearing the way for the next phase of building a freeway.

We have an update for you on the Hell Canyon Bridge replacement project that isn’t infernal at all…

As you can see in the photos above, work continues on the $14.4 million improvement project designed to replace the historic, 61-year-old Hell Canyon Bridge with a new four-span steel-plate girder bridge.

That brand new 665-foot-long, two-lane bridge will feature wider travel lanes and will be approximately 47 feet wide, more than 17 feet wider than the current bridge. The bridge will also accommodate heavier loads, ensuring commercial trucks can conveniently carry goods and produce to their final destinations, particularly when I-40 traffic is diverted onto SR 89 during serious crashes.

Right now, crews are done with the blasting work that was necessary to build the construction access roads. The project is currently moving into the next phase, which includes construction of the new Hell Canyon Bridge to the east of the existing bridge, followed by switching traffic to the new bridge and finally dismantling and removing the existing bridge.

The project began earlier this summer and is expected to be completed in late 2016.

For more information, revisit our previous blog post.

Despite the name, Hell Canyon Bridge actually sits in a delightful part of the state.

Located within Yavapai County on State Route 89, the nearly 600-foot bridge is about 18 miles north of Chino Valley and has served as an important link between Prescott and northern Arizona since it was built in 1954.

ADOT has started a project that will replace the Hell Canyon Bridge with a new four-span steel-plate girder bridge. Click on the photos above to view slideshow.

Back then, according to the Historic Bridge Inventory, the three-span steel deck truss bridge cost the Arizona Highway Department $325,000 to build.

Now, 61 years later, ADOT has embarked on a $14.4 million improvement project that will replace the historic bridge with a new four-span steel-plate girder bridge.

That brand new 665-foot-long two-lane bridge will feature wider travel lanes and will be approximately 47 feet wide, more than 17 feet wider than the current bridge. The bridge will also accommodate heavier loads, ensuring commercial trucks can conveniently carry goods and produce to their final destinations, particularly when I-40 traffic is diverted onto SR 89 during serious crashes.

What drivers need to know

Motorists can expect limited impacts during construction! Traffic gets to remain on the existing bridge throughout construction because the new bridge is being built east of the current bridge.

Crews have already started work, as you can see in the photos above…

The first phase of the project, which is expected to take up to 12 months to complete, will include construction of the new bridge as well as temporary access roads along the north and south sides of the canyon to assist with bridge construction and removal (this project animation provides a good idea of what to expect).

Daytime blasting operations, which began on July 14, will be required for the construction of the access roads and intermittent closures will be necessary during that time. Delays of up to 20 minutes are possible until blasting operations are completed by the end of next month. ADOT will send advance notice to the public when any closure dates are finalized.

After the new bridge is completed, traffic will be switched to the new bridge. The existing Hell Canyon Bridge will then be dismantled and removed, which is expected to take up to three months. Additional road construction/realignment will be necessary to the north and south of the new bridge.

For more details, please visit the project page.