Rebuilding the Baltimore bridge destroyed by a container ship in March will cost between $1.7 billion and $1.9 billion, according to Maryland estimates, Report informs referring to The Washington Post.
Officials are targeting fall 2028 for completing the new bridge, Maryland Transportation Secretary Paul J. Wiedefeld said in an interview.
The replacement for the Francis Scott Key Bridge, which opened in 1977, will be designed to meet modern safety standards and will not be vulnerable to collapse if a single component fails, Wiedefeld said. Its towers may also be placed farther apart to give ships a bigger buffer, he said.
Maryland officials said the cost estimates are in line with projects of a similar scale and complexity, including the Long Beach International Gateway Bridge in California, which opened in 2020 and cost about $1.5 billion. The Key Bridge replacement, like the Long Beach bridge, will be designed as a “cable-stayed” span, in which the bridge deck is held up by cables connected to towers.
The federal government stands to be repaid from insurance on the bridge, potentially hundreds of millions of dollars, and could receive additional funds from legal proceedings against companies that are found to be responsible for the collision, Wiedefeld said.
The cost estimates and timeline come as a congressional delegation set out Thursday to survey the wreckage and the stranded Singapore-flagged cargo ship Dali that created it after losing power and slamming into the bridge on March 26.