Staff photo by Cathy Spaulding
The Oklahoma Department of Transportation recently completed the Oklahoma 51 bridge across the Grand River at Fort Gibson Lake. ODOT Engineer Darren Saliba said traffic was switched from an old truss bridge to the new bridge shortly before Christmas. He said the next project would be demolition of the truss bridge. He said workers are beginning to remove the deck of the truss bridge. He said repairs also need to be made to roadways leading to the bridge. He said the new bridge has two 12-foot driving lanes and two 10-foot shoulders. The bridge project costs about $16.9 million and follows a $9.2 million project to build an Oklahoma 51 causeway across part of the river.