Transportation officials from the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet and the Ohio Department of Transportation held court at the Kenton County Building Wednesday to field questions, ease concerns and share information with the Northern Kentucky community regarding the highly anticipated Brent Spence Bridge Corridor Project.
As of now, much of the fundamental design process is completed. What still needs to be hashed out are aesthetic design elements and how the new bridge will fit within the surrounding communities. Covington Mayor Joe Meyer encouraged residents and business owners to attend the meetings in order to understand the short and long term impacts of the project on the region’s transportation network.
“This is one of the biggest infrastructure projects in the history of the region, and with its proximity to our community, Covington has a vested interest in continuing to shape its size and look,” Meyer said.
Project officials held two different meetings on Dec. 14, one from noon to 2 p.m. and another from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. The crowd from the earliest meeting was fairly large, consisting mainly of retirees and community officials such as outgoing 65th District Rep. Buddy Wheatley (D-Covington). Renderings and construction plans outlined the perimeter of the Reidlin Schott Community Room, with KYTC and ODOT representatives on standby to provide further context to audience members.
“Stormwater drainage and aesthetics, those are common themes that we have heard from neighborhoods ahead of these meetings,” said Stacee Hans, KYTC Brent Spence Bridge Corridor Project manager. “These are conversations, input and feedback that we’d like to get from the neighborhoods, as well as pedestrians and cyclists.”
Originally completed in 1963, the Brent Spence Bridge was supposed to carry around 80,000 vehicles a day. In 2022, it has carried approximately double that. Freight trucks and local commuters are affected when the bridge is out of service, a phenomenon that happened as recently as 2021. If the bridge is out of service, it forces drivers to find alternate routes, which in turn congests local traffic and puts more strain on other bridges.
The infrastructure project will be one of the largest and most expensive in the region’s history. From Fort Mitchell to just north of the Western Hills viaduct in Cincinnati, 7.8 miles of interstate is slated to be redesigned and upgraded. A new five-lane companion bridge will be built directly to the west of the Brent Spence Bridge, with the original being revitalized. The companion bridge is going to be oriented toward interstate travel while the original bridge will hold mostly local traffic. Overall, the project will cost in the $3 billion to $3.8 billion range.
“If you’ve driven the corridor, you know that one of our absolute needs is to improve traffic flow, level of service and improve safety,” Hans said. “We can do that by looking at our shoulders. We can do that by looking at weaving movements, correct geometric deficiencies, but another key component of our purpose in need is to maintain connections to key regional and national transportation corridors.”
Construction will affect the Covington neighborhoods of MainStrasse Village, Westside, Peaselburg and Mutter Gottes/Central Business District, along with other Kentucky cities such as Fort Wright, Fort Mitchell, Park Hills and Ludlow.
The evening session offered perspective from homeowners and residents regarding unanswered questions about the impact of the project.
Project officials noted in their presentation how, in addition to a lower speed limit, safety will be implemented into the design through functional design elements. One resident asked the presenter how these new elements and lower speed limit will hold drivers accountable.
“How will anyone guarantee that drivers will actually slow down to the new speed limit?” she asked.
Her request was addressed with a reminder that the lowered speed limit is part of a proposed “collector distributor system.”
“We have the opportunity that people will innately slow down because you have traffic going on and coming off,” Hans said. “The interstate traffic (I-71/I75) is pulled off in the new bridge, the connector bridge.”
Attendees were encouraged to visit the City of Covington website the following day to see the renderings and concepts.
Later, the same concerned resident voiced her disapproval over the impacts for the city as a whole.
“I came here wanting to know what will be done to offset the impacts,” she said. “People don’t want to be blanketed in blacktop. Covington doesn’t exist to continue to get gobbled up so that people can get from frickin’ Michigan to Florida.”
The public has been encouraged to provide their feedback about the project online, encouraging people to go to their website established for that purpose: publicinput.com/bsbc
