Missouri DOT Cuts Ribbon on New I-70 Rocheport Bridge

The span over the Missouri River features twin 3,120-foot-long, three-lane bridges, with the final lanes set to open by the end...

Dec 12, 2024 - 11:35

Missouri DOT Cuts Ribbon on New I-70 Rocheport Bridge

More than a year after the previous structure was demolished, the Missouri Department of Transportation has cut the ribbon on a new $220 million Rocheport bridge over the Missouri River.

State and MoDOT officials gathered on December 10 on the nearly complete eastbound Lance Corporal Leon Deraps I-70 Missouri River Bridge to celebrate the project. The bridge contractor Lunda Construction and its subcontractors who worked to build the bridge beginning in early 2022 were also in attendance.

The new structure features twin 3,120-foot-long three-lane bridges made up of five weathering steel-plate girder spans and 10 pre-stressed concrete girder approach spans. The new bridges are designed to have a 100-year lifespan.

The first of the new bridges was completed in June 2023. That bridge has carried more than 37,000 vehicles, including 8,800 commercial vehicles, each day in both directions across the river.

Eastbound traffic will be shifted to the new second bridge by the end of the year, and final work on the bridge is expected to be completed in late Spring 2025.

The demolition of the previous structure, which was built in 1960 and had reached the end of its useful life, dropped 6 million pounds of steel into the Missouri River.

Had MoDOT decided to renovate the previous structure, the project would have only extended the bridge’s life by 10 years and would have backed up traffic for three to eight hours at a time for a lengthy period on the state’s major east-west artery, the agency said.