Why This South Jersey Bridge Project Is Taking a Decade and Costing a Fortune

In the state of New Jersey, most of the transportation infrastructure that motorists use on a daily basis was originally constructed 60-90 years ago. Many of the bridges and highways were built before many changes in modern technology have evolved commuting habits and traffic volume.

Since 2009, the New Jersey Department of Transportation (NJDOT) Local Bridges Fund has been allocating money to help repair bridges around the state. These grants have given new life to numerous bridges that are major connections from the Jersey Shore to the mainland.

But in New Jersey's southernmost county, one of the region's most important bridges has become so expensive to repair that it needs to be replaced. There is a record price for this bridge project that goes beyond the grant money from the Local Bridges Fund.

This Cape May County Bridge Will Need To Be Replaced In The Next 10 Years

First opened in June 1940, the Ocean Highway was opened to connect Cape May Island to The Wildwoods. The Middle Thorofare Bridge is the biggest of three bridges that give motorists a direct connection from Wildwood Crest to Cape May.

In recent years, the single-leaf bascule span bridge has required numerous repairs to maintain its structural integrity and handle to volume of traffic using the bridge throughout the year. The combination of Federal, State, and Local Funding have covered the costs for repairs but engineers have determined the three bridges need to be replaced.

A local concept development study in 2017 concluded that the three bridges need to be replaced with one long bridge, similar to the Route 52 Causeway that connects Ocean City and Somers Point.

Now renamed Sainton Memorial Causeway, the project faced numerous construction delays because it was a state highway that required a plethora of red tape to be worked through. The Ocean Highway is part of County Route 621. Also known as Ocean Drive, this County Highway connects all the coastal communities from Cape May through Ocean City to Absecon Island.

Cape May County Engineer Robert Church said at a recent County Commissioners Meeting that the new cost for the new bridge project has risen to $350 million. This would make this the largest county project and most expensive transportation-related project in the county's history.

The cost of the project, along with the immense size of what will go into building this new bridge, has forced the construction to take ten years. This means the new bridge will not be built before the end of this decade. The current expectation is this will now be completed in the next ten years.

The 2.2 miles of construction roadway that will make up this new bridge will be approximately 9 feet higher than the current three bridges. Also, the project will elevate this stretch of Ocean Drive by four feet to accommodate new flood elevation regulations.

New Jersey's southernmost county has plenty of reasons why you should visit and check out everything Cape May County has to offer: