Gov. Kate Brown wants Oregon to accelerate plans to replace the Interstate 5 Bridge.
Assuming Washington’s Legislature approves a $17.5 million request from Gov. Jay Inslee to open a new bistate office to lead design, engineering and public outreach for a new bridge, Brown said Oregon must be ready to act. If the money comes through, that joint office should be opened by the end of the year, Brown said.
In a March 20 letter to the chair of the Oregon Transportation Commission, Brown said the aging bridge spanning the Columbia River is “a seismic risk, a freight bottleneck, a barrier to effective public transportation and a source of some of the worst gridlock in the nation.”
“Its current condition poses a threat to Oregon’s economic vitality,” Brown wrote to Tammy Baney, who leads the state’s top transportation decision-making body, “and is negatively impacting the livability of our state.”
The letter is the latest indication the moribund project, which died in 2014 when Oregon finally walked away one year after Washington lawmakers declined to pay for its share of the ill-fated Columbia River Crossing project, is gearing up once again.
Oregon and Washington share maintenance costs for the bridge, and big-ticket items are looming. The states punted some upkeep projects, like painting the bridge to prevent deterioration, assuming a new bridge would be built. It wasn’t, and those projects cumulatively will add some $282 million by 2040.
Brown said that should the Washington Legislature approve the line item for the joint project office, Oregon must be ready to act by July 1 when those resources are available. She said Oregon’s transportation department should start talking with their Washington counterparts to “begin planning for the future.”
Last month, Washington lawmakers approved a spending bill that included $450 million for the Interstate 5 bridge project. Sen. Annette Cleveland, D-Vancouver, one of the chief backers pushing a new bridge discussion, called the line-item a “down payment” and expected Oregon and federal officials to chip in as well as the project becomes a reality.
A bipartisan group of Washington lawmakers has been leading the way back to the bargaining table in the past year, led by Cleveland and other Clark County leaders. Brown’s spokeswoman didn’t immediately respond when asked if Oregon should preemptively approve funding for the bridge project as well.
Brown has maintained publicly that light rail must be a component of any bridge project, as has Inslee.
Brown’s March letter doesn’t specifically mention light rail, but she said Oregon needs to get to work. “Bistate partnership starts with a plan, and the time to build that plan is now,” she wrote.
Planning should include a project structure that “ensures effective decision-making and accountability,” she wrote, as well as a plan for public involvement and engagement with residents and elected officials.
Oregon and Washington have incentives to restart bridge talks.
If they haven’t shown federal officials, they are making progress toward reviving a bridge discussion by September, a $140 million debt from past planning costs will be due.
