(Radio Iowa) – There’s now a timeline for the closing of the old Mississippi River bridge from Lansing to Wisconsin, and the opening of the new bridge. D-O-T Highway Division Administrator Tony Gustafson says the old bridge will close October 15th. “When the bridge is closed on October 15th, they’ll begin demolition immediately on the existing bridge…removing the deck panels manually, but also using dynamite to demo the bridge,” he says. Gustafson says work on the new bridge will require work that has caused the old bridge to move in the past and they need to proceed with that work. He told the Transportation Commission they have an updated schedule for opening the new bridge.

“Trying to open up the bridge to a one-lane of traffic in March of 2027…it’s a steel truss bridge, so the steel truss members have to be painted with a special paint, twice, not only once but twice, so that’s why they have to look at opening the bridge to one lane of traffic when they work on one side of the bridge painting the steel members and they’ll switch traffic to the other side to paint the other side steel members,” Gustafson says. He says they’ve been able to make good progress on the new bridge. “The construction is still progressing very well…in a couple weeks they’ll have all the substructure work complete which are all the piers and abutments, and they’re looking at starting the steel erection from the Iowa side east,” he says.

Gustafson says they are working on some things to help motorists until the new bridge is open. One option is to bring the Cassville ferry to the area. “Hoping to get them to the site, to Lansing, during that October to April timeframe when they are not working,” Gustafson says. “They would go back to Cassville in April. We’re looking at a couple of the different ferry options for permanent service while the bridge is out of service.” Gustafson says they are working on environmental clearance to build the dock walls to service the ferry. “One dock wall on the Iowa side will be at the Lansing marina and then the other dock wall will be at the Cops of Engineers beneficial use site on the Wisconsin side which is right next to where the contractor is staging their work,” he says. “We may have to do some mussel relocations and some other environmental clearances before we can start building those dock walls.”

He says they hope to complete the entire project by the end of 2027.