US 54 bridge opens

LOGAN - A resident who attended a ceremony last week celebrating the opening of a $23.5 million bridge on U.S. 54 over the Canadian River witnessed to a similar event for the previous bridge 67 years ago.

Because of his link to history, state transportation officials asked Alvin Keith to participate in the ceremonial ribbon-cutting Wednesday morning at the 700-foot bridge's north side, which he was glad to do.

"I feel really privileged to watch this, to say I was here," Keith said afterward.

Keith recalled the 1954 dedication of the then-new bridge.

"It was exciting; I was 14 back then. There were a bunch of people here at that time, too," he said. "We were waiting for them to blow the old bridge up. But they couldn't get things set up, and I had to leave."

Keith said the 1954 deck truss bridge replaced a steel, one-lane span.

"It looks a lot like the railroad bridge we have right now," he said. "You had to wait to see whether anyone else was coming, and when you drove across, you had to flash your lights - those old 6-volt lights that weren't that bright - when you drove across one at a time.

"The new bridge opened things up like you wouldn't believe," he added.

Nearly seven decades later, New Mexico Department of Transportation District 4 engineer James Gallegos, who served as the master of ceremonies Wednesday, said an outdated span was being replaced again.

"The bridge is 67 years old," Gallegos said before the event. "It's basically lived its designed life. We've gotten what we could get out of this bridge, and at this point it is a safety concern."

He noted the old bridge has shoulders just one foot wide, compared to 6-foot shoulders on the new span.

"We're hoping this one will last another 60 to 70 years. I think it will be maintenance-free compared to the other steel structure. I'll be long gone by the time this bridge is gone," he said.

Fisher Sand and Gravel of Placitas was the general contractor.

About 50 people attended the ceremony Wednesday.

"I didn't think we'd have a crowd like this. It's pretty amazing," Gallegos said.

Scott Parnell, administrator for the village of Logan, was reluctant to speak ill of the old bridge, saying simply the new one is "a substantial upgrade."

Parnell was more effusive in talking about the new bridge and its impact on the village.

"It is huge," he said. "Between the gross receipts we've earned during construction, plus what it's going to do for traffic, we get 6,500 vehicles through the village of Logan per day and 3,200 are large trucks. This is just a great opportunity. This will be the last time I'll go through a project like this, in my lifetime. This is just a tremendous shot in the arm to the village.

"I'm glad it's finally open so I can quit answering the question of 'When's it going to open?'" he added, laughing.

The three years of construction on the new bridge encountered a few delays, including redesigning its piers when a saltwater aquifer was found at the site. It also cost about $3 million more than projected.

"Any big project like this, we always have issues that come up, and we have to work together to take care of those issues," Gallegos said. "Our Tucumcari project manager did a hell of a job keeping this project moving forward. Even during the pandemic, we didn't shut down. We wanted to make sure we had quality project for the taxpayers of New Mexico."

Gallegos said the huge scale of the project is noteworthy. The bridge contains more than 500 tons of rebar and 3,300 cubic yards of concrete.

"If you go to Albuquerque to the Big I, which is Interstate 40 and Interstate 25 interchange, that's a project a lot like this one," he said. "There are probably only five to 10 structures like this in the state of New Mexico."

Gallegos said demolition on the old bridge would begin in sometime in July.

"We hate to demo it, but it's very expensive to maintain a structure like that," he said. "We'll start demoing the bridge in the next couple of weeks. But we have to protect the Canadian River. We can't just drop the bridge into the middle of it. It's going to take some time to get that done."

Gallegos and Parnell were unaware if anyone ever proposed deeding the old bridge to the village. Both expressed skepticism at such a proposition.

"If you offer it to the village, they have to maintain it, and that's very expensive. I'm sure the village has other things they have to deal with other than putting money into that structure," Gallegos said.

As they did 67 years ago, Logan police and fire vehicles were allowed to be the first vehicles to drive across the new span.

About an hour after the ceremony ended, officials stopped traffic on the approaches and moved the barricades that would close access to the old bridge and open the new one. With no traffic on either bridge, the only noise for several minutes was insects chirping along the river banks below.

Northbound traffic began to move across the bridge at 11:18 a.m. Southbound traffic was slowed to a crawl for several minutes by an escorting highway truck before it began moving normally.

An NMDOT spokesman contacted by email didn't offer an explanation about the brief slowdown of southbound traffic after the bridge opened. A Logan firefighter securing a barricade at the north side of the old bridge said highway workers had slowed southbound traffic because they still were painting highway lines on the new roadway.

"Too many chiefs and not enough Indians, I guess," the firefighter said.