The Yale Street Bridge has been around since 1931 and it’s listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
But the past few years have brought a lot of development to the neighborhood, forcing TxDOT to put a load limit on the bridge. It’s located just south of I-10.
The agency is now moving forward on replacing the four-lane bridge at a cost of about $2.8 million dollars.
“We’ve seen an increase in a lot of vehicular traffic, including the heavier trucks,” says TxDOT’s Danny Perez. “So this is a way of improving safety and improving the condition of that particular bridge.”
Perez says the work is going to take a while. The new Yale Street Bridge isn’t expected to be finished until December of 2017. That means drivers will have to get used to some detours near a busy shopping area.
“If you’re traveling going southbound for instance, you can use Heights Boulevard,” adds Perez. “On the northbound side you would use some adjacent city streets.”
TxDOT says the new bridge will look a lot like the old one, and they plan to incorporate bricks from the original roadbed into some decorative elements.