The headache caused to motorists by the temporary closure of the East Hardy Street bridge that connects Petal and Hattiesburg over the Leaf River should soon abate, as officials hope to have that project complete and re-opened to the public within the next couple of weeks.
Members of the Forrest County Board of Supervisors recently released another update regarding work on the bridge, which includes almost a dozen measures that have recently been completed on the way to replacing the bridge that is more than 70 years old.
“We are on target for mid-April (to re-open the bridge), and I’ve asked (engineers) for a specific date, but we don’t have that just yet,” said Terri Bell, president of the Forrest County Board of Supervisors. “But we’re going to start doing some paving real soon, and that project is going to be coming to completion in the very near future.”
Over the past week or so, workers have:
- Continued forming and pouring tops and gutters of curb inlets;
- Formed and poured concrete driveways on the Hattiesburg side of the bridge;
- Finished pouring the exterior curb and gutter;
- Graded and poured curb and gutter median islands;
- Installed and graded fill material for median islands;
- Continued backfilling the curb and grading the shoulders;
- Continued installing fill material and grading for the sidewalks;
- Formed and poured sections of barrier rail on the bridge;
- Poured the concrete for the finger joint at Bent 5; and
- Started work on the installation of the finger joint at Bent 2.
The bridge shut down on January 22 to allow work on those measures.
“We are just excited about getting traffic back on the bridge, so that people between Petal and Hattiesburg can cross over,” Bell said. “I think everybody has been really patient with it, and so kind, and we’re glad that we’re at this point that we’re going to be able to get it open to traffic, so everybody can go back in forth again.”
However, some upcoming drainage work just south of Carterville Road in Petal will necessitate a closure of a small portion of South Main Street once work on the bridge is complete. That closure, which will take place along South Main from the red light at Carterville Road to Dawson Cutoff, is expected to last approximately a month.
Bell said that work could be completed while the bridge project progresses, but that measure would have made it more difficult for the businesses in that area, including the MJ Discount convenience store and Cochran’s Muffler and Auto Shop.
“Those (businesses) would have to have traffic come down Carterville (Road), turn on Dawson Cutoff, and it would make it not as successful for their businesses,” she said. “So what’s going to occur is that once we open the bridge, and we have traffic coming through that area, we will have a little detour that’s going to take you down Dawson Cutoff up to Carterville (Road).
“(That way), those businesses will be accessible and people will be able to get to them before we shut off the area just south of the red light. We just want them as busy as we possibly can with all this construction that’s going on.”
Officials are currently working to complete a new bridge adjacent to the current bridge, which will replace the structure that has connected Hattiesburg and Petal for more than 70 years.
Officials had originally considered demolishing the current bridge, but after learning that endeavor would cost approximately $1 million, the decision was made to leave the structure and transform it into a pedestrian bridge. The funds for that project will come from the Leaf and Bouie Redevelopment District, which was recently established to take the taxes from each side of the Leaf and Bouie rivers and reinvest them back into those areas of Hattiesburg, Petal and Forrest County.
“We have that district set up down there, and that’s bringing in some revenue for the second or third year,” said David Hogan, former president of the Forrest County Board of Supervisors, in a previous story. “So we’ll have some money built up to do some stuff to the old bridge once it’s not in use anymore.
“It’s going to be a destination point. There will be a walking path and some lighting, and we’ll probably paint it during events.”
With the help of matching grants from the United States Department of Transportation, officials from Petal, Forrest County and Hattiesburg are working to put forward matching grants to make a walking path possible on the bridge. The funds would come from the department of transportation’s Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity discretionary grant program for 2024, which is designed to help communities around the country carry out projects with significant local or regional impact.
“I’m extremely excited about taking this step forward for the city to partner with Forrest County and the City of Petal to make the old East Hardy bridge an asset to our entire community,” Hattiesburg City Council president Jeffrey George said in a previous story. “I think the potential addition of this pedestrian path will help us continue to expand outdoor recreation opportunities and will further our mission to realize the Leaf River as an asset to our city.”
