CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) – The City of Charleston’s traffic and transportation committee met on Tuesday night to further discuss their plans for a project that has been in the works for a while.
Last month, Charleston Mayor William Cogswell presented two design plans to the committee for how the Ashley River pedestrian bridge should connect to the peninsula.
The city’s original proposal featured a pedestrian bridge that would come over the slip or merge lane on Lockwood Drive and connect into Bee Street and further into the medical district.
However, Cogswell presented an alternative plan that includes a landing pad, or pedestrian roundabout, where the bridge meets the peninsula. It would be an elevated structure that connects to Brittlebank Park and Bee Street and includes a viewing platform of the Ashley River. The proposal would also allow for a connection between the landing pad and the Battery path in the future.
On Tuesday night, it was approved by the traffic and transportation committee to move forward with getting design drawings on this alternative plan and Cogswell said they will bring it to the city council next.
“I think it will be safer and it will be a lot more pedestrian friendly as well, so excited about that,” Cogswell said. “Trying to tie all of these things together and be thoughtful about them because when you design projects like this you want to make sure you’re not just thinking two or three years down the road, you want to think twenty-five, fifty years down the road.”
City leaders are continuing to look at ways to address safety concerns for the slip lane coming off of the vehicle bridge onto Lockwood Drive by working with the South Carolina Department of Transportation. Cogswell said with that lane being wide drivers speed through it and they need to find a way to slow them down as people will be crossing there.
Katie Zimmerman with bicycle and pedestrian advocacy group Charleston Moves has been keeping up with this project for years. She says seeing it moving forward is a huge deal.
“Actually seeing construction starting, actually seeing sort of close to finalized designs, those are two steps where it’s just really, I cannot emphasize enough how exciting this is,” Zimmerman said. “Particularly as somebody who’s been biking over the existing bridges for 17 or 18 years now.”
A part of the plan that Zimmerman is happy to see is that it connects to the medical district.
“It makes sense right? This is going to be a really busy transportation corridor for the people getting around not in a car and so we’ve got to make sure that they connect directly to the densest job area in the city,” Zimmerman said.
The total cost of this plan is $92 million, however, the city’s portion is only about $10 million of that total. Cogswell said the remaining will be covered by federal funding.
Cogswell said that construction of this project has already begun on the West Ashley side and it will make its way over to the peninsula side. He said it is expected to be built by the end of 2027.
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