About the project
The new bridge
The new bridge design concept
The new bridge design features bike and pedestrian facilities, a look out and traffic shoulders.
Roundabout on the Washington State side of the bridge.
A new bridge will support a thriving economy and livable communities. The new bridge design will address problems with river navigation, vehicle travel, pedestrian and bicycle connections, transit access, and safety.
The design is a modern, wide, concrete bridge with one 12-foot lane in each direction with 8-foot shoulders. It will also include a 12-foot walking and biking path on its west side. It will accommodate all anticipated heavy loads and will have a 45 mph speed limit to safely blend with existing interchanges on both sides of the river.
It will be located slightly downstream from the existing bridge; however, the approaches on both sides of the river will be close to where they are now.
New bridge benefits
Wider lanes. Regulation lane widths with shoulders facilitate safe flow of traffic at highway speed.
Safer navigation. The new bridge will provide more space for barges to more easily navigate underneath the bridge.
Seismically resilient. This will ensure the bridge will remain a critical connection for the Gorge after a major earthquake.
Reduced maintenance cost. Modern design and materials will reduce maintenance costs over the lifespan of the new bridge.
A bike and pedestrian path. New separated facilities for people walking, biking and rolling will increase equity, access and tourism.
Environmental benefits. A storm water collection system will eliminate direct runoff from vehicles into the Columbia River.
We’ll keep using the current bridge until the new bridge is ready, then we’ll remove the old bridge. With a walking and biking path on the new bridge, we won’t need the old bridge — and we’ll save the expense of maintaining it.
Where we are now and next steps
The draft Environmental Impact Study (EIS) is prepared, and the project team expects a Record of Decision (ROD) in late 2024, which will finalize the EIS. The project is moving forward with securing funding, design, and geotechnical testing to understand the site conditions underground. The Hood River-White Salmon Bridge Authority was established on July 1, 2023, and now oversees the bridge replacement project.
Cost & Funding
In the fall of 2024, the project team received an updated estimate of $1.12 billion to design and build the new bridge. This latest figure is an early estimate developed to support the project’s application for federal funding. This estimate will continue to be refined as the design moves forward. Future updates of the estimate will be completed as part of the base design (15%), preliminary design (60%) and advanced design (100%) submittals.
The project team is seeking additional federal funding in the form of a Bridge Investment Program grant to provide the funding needed to move forward with construction of the project.
Currently, the project has secured about $328 million in funding. Out of that, Washington State has committed $75 million, and Oregon has pledged $20 million. The project has secured about $222 million in federal grants, including a $200 million grant through the federal INFRA (Nationally Significant Multimodal Freight & Highway Projects) program.
The federal grants also include a $3.6 million award from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) program, which will be used to plan for the bike and pedestrian access on the bridge, as well as planning for the expansion of the bike/pedestrian network that the bridge will connect to on both the Oregon and Washington sides.
Large infrastructure projects are often funded by a combination of federal and state grants and loans, as well as local funding. Federal funding regulations allow for up to 80% of a project cost to be paid with federal funds. The funding plan for the new bridge is below this threshold. State funding requests remain at $125 million each from Oregon and Washington.
The costs for the new bridge not covered by state funds and federal grants will need to be paid with a federal TIFIA loan. This is considered the local share of the project, since it will be repaid with toll revenue. TIFIA Loans are government-backed, low-interest, and usually taken out against project-related revenue streams, such as tolls. The project is in the process of securing a maximum loan of $105M that is backed by the toll increase that was put in place on the current bridge in 2023. All new revenue from that toll increase is put into a restricted fund to be used only for the new bridge.
Bridge Owner
The Hood River-White Salmon Bridge Authority was formed in July 2023 to oversee the planning, financing, design and construction of the new Hood River-White Salmon Bridge. Following construction, the authority will control operations, maintenance and toll-setting for the new bridge. The authority is governed by a board of six voting commissioners, with Klickitat County and Hood River County appointing three members each.
The Port of Hood River owns, operates, maintains and sets tolls on the existing bridge, and will continue to do so until the new bridge is complete. The port has no decision rights for the new bridge.