By Allison Perrine
RUMSON – Community members are joining local officials in urging the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) to reconsider the overall vertical clearance of the proposed new Oceanic Bridge connecting Rumson Borough and Middletown Township.
The existing movable bridge (S-31), an 80-year-old superstructure in need of replacement, sits 22 feet above the water at mean high tide. Under the recommended plan, the new fixed bridge would sit 65 feet above water at mean high tide. Now, members of the Friends of the Oceanic Bridge Association are asking the USCG to lower that 65-foot requirement to 50 feet – and they’re encouraging others to echo their request.
“This is a very important local project and residents on both sides of the river deserve to have their opinions heard on this matter,” said Todd E. Thompson, president of Friends of the Oceanic Bridge Association, Inc., a grassroots organization that began in 2004. “A 15-foot height reduction may not sound like much but it represents a 30 percent decrease, which will have a significant impact on the aesthetics of the structure and how people use the bridge, which will be more than twice as high as the current bridge.”
According to the county, the existing double leaf bascule superstructure’s overall length is 2,717 feet and its bridge cartway width is 32 feet. Studies have found the bridge to be “structurally deficient,” “functionally obsolete” and “nearing the end of its service life.” The substructure is in “poor condition” with wide cracking, deep spalls and exposed and heavily rusted steel.
County officials have been working on the project for at least five years and have evaluated at least 26 alternatives to date, including options of not rebuilding the bridge, re- habilitating it, completing a modified rehabilitation and constructing in a new location. The latest plan is to build a new, $145 million fixed-span bridge which would include the removal of all bridge openings, provide wider sidewalks on both sides, provide shoulders for cyclists, eliminate annual operation costs of the movable span, provide a lower life cycle cost, maintain public access and more, according to the county. It will be constructed alongside the existing bridge to allow public use for a majority of the construction period.
The project will be funded with federal monies and because of that, the county has been working on the plans with members of the state Transportation Planning Authority for the past several years.
Thompson does not argue that the bridge should not be replaced, nor do local officials who also op- pose the proposed vertical clearance – or vertical passage space – such as Middletown Mayor Tony Perry. He told The Two River Times in April after a meeting with USCG members that a fixed-span “is the right way to go when it comes to replacing the Oceanic Bridge.”
“We can’t go back to the days of what we currently have and spend all this money on a replacement and not understand that it is time to replace it with a fixed-span. But then that calls into question how high,” he said.
“Do we really need a 65-foot bridge to go into a river that has very shallow, navigable waters?” Perry questioned.
The 65-foot suggestion came from the USCG. In a March 2019 letter issued to the state Transit Planning Authority, the Coast Guard stated that if the bridge were to be replaced with a fixed bridge alternative, at least 65 feet of clearance at mean high water would be required – similar to the Captain Joseph Azzolina Memorial Bridge connecting Highlands and Sea Bright boroughs.
“The Navesink River at milepost 4.5 is heavily trafficked by a large number of recreational vessels with varying VC (vertical clearance) requirements,” the letter states. “The commercial industry is mostly boat rentals, charters for sailing and fishing excursions, and occasional barge transits.”
But after a meeting organized by U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-4) with USCG members and local, county and state officials this March, the USCG is willing to take more public comments. Now the public, boat owners and mariners can voice their opinions on the plans so long as they do so in writing with sufficient detail to clearly convey their reasoning for supporting or opposing the proposed plan. Boat owners are also asked to provide information about their vessels such as the type of vessel, overall length, draft, beam, etc.; mariners are asked to include comments on navigational access, safety issues and more.
What’s disappointing for objectors to the vertical clearance, like Thompson and other members of the Friends of the Oceanic Bridge Association, he said, is that the USCG has asked for public comments throughout the process and, despite the objections, the plans went through. He gave an example of when county and NJTPA officials collected public comments on the preliminary preferred alternative (PPA) for a replacement of the Oceanic Bridge last fall. Of the nearly 400 responses, about 84 percent of them objected to a high fixed-span bridge, Thompson.
“But that didn’t seem to bear any weight with the powers that be because it was all about the money,” said Thompson. “We (Friends of the Oceanic Bridge) wanted a 45-foot-high drawbridge; we thought that that would be good to let 97 percent of the boats through without having to open the bridge,” he said.
Comments can be sent to donna.dleoce@uscg.mil. Written comments can also be sent by mail to Commander (dpb), First Coast Guard District, Battery Park Building, 1 South St., New York, NY 10004-1466. The comment period closes Aug. 13. The project can be reviewed at monmouthcountytoceanicbridge.com.
This article originally appeared in the July 29 – Aug. 4, 2021 print edition of The Two River Times.
