Wolf Administration Local Bridge Program to Benefit Chester County

Wolf Administration Local Bridge Program to Benefit Chester County

9/28/2017-HARRISBURG

A local bridge improvement program announced as part of the Wolf
Administration's Road Maintenance and Preservation, or Road MaP, initiative

will make possible a partnership to rehabilitate a bridge in Chester
County,
Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) Secretary Leslie S.
Richards said today.

"We're improving hundreds of state-owned bridges every year and this Road
MaP
program is one way that we're helping local governments with the bridges
that
they own," Richards said. "I commend the county and our regional planning
partner for recognizing and acting on these needed improvements in Chester
County."

The Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission (DVRPC) today approved
adding
a bridge on Township Road over the west branch of Big Elk Creek in Lower
Oxford
Township to its transportation improvement program, a necessary step as
part of
PennDOT's collaborative planning process with metropolitan and regional
planning organizations statewide. The estimated $2 million bridge
rehabilitation will use federal funds made available for local bridge
partnerships announced as part of Road MaP.

Through Road MaP, PennDOT is making opportunities available for counties
who
have taken steps to enhance their transportation networks by collecting the
$5
vehicle registration fee enabled by Act 89 of 2013, the state
transportation
plan.

The partnership makes available up to $2 million for each county that has
passed a fee resolution, with a 50-percent local match commitment required
to
secure the program funding. Chester County has committed to using funding
collected from the vehicle registration fee to rehabilitate its Allerton
Road
bridge over the east branch of Brandywine Creek in East Bradford Township
for
an estimated $3 million for use as its partnership match.

"With approximately a third of our local bridges in structurally deficient
status, the opportunity to leverage a county's decision to implement the
additional $5 registration fee for improving local bridges plus benefit
from an
additional $2 million for local bridges is a great mechanism which will
ultimately benefit our entire region," DVRPC Associate Director for
Transportation Elizabeth Schoonmaker said. "Keeping our bridges in a state
of
good repair is good for our economy and our quality of life, and it is
great to
have this program as one of the tools in our toolbox to address local
needs."

The structurally deficient bridge on Township Road was constructed in 1924,
has
a weight limit of 20 tons and sees roughly 1,500 vehicles daily. The
Allerton
Road bridge is one of only two historic thru trusses owned and maintained
by
the county.

Chester County Commissioners' Chair and DVRPC board member Michelle
Kichline
noted, "One of our main priorities as county commissioners is that of the
safety of our citizens, and the reason that we decided to enact the $5
vehicle
registration fee in Chester County was that the funds raised would go
directly
to repairing or replacing our bridges, thus helping to keep those who use
our
bridges safe. Of the 95 bridges that Chester County owns, 60 percent of
them
are over 75 years old and increasingly are in need of rebuilding or
rehabilitation. We are pleased that the funds raised by the vehicle
registration fee will be used in this instance to leverage the significant
additional Road MaP funding from PennDOT – thus speeding up the
rehabilitation
process for another county bridge."

This component of Road MaP is aimed at addressing the needs of
Pennsylvania's
6,477 locally owned bridges, of which 2,038 – or more than 31 percent – are

structurally deficient. The need to improve local bridges was underscored
when
the biennial Transportation Performance Report, assembled by PennDOT, the
State
Transportation Commission, and the Transportation Advisory Committee and
viewable at www.TalkPATransportation.com, identified local bridges as the
only
category receiving a "low" performance rating.

Follow PennDOT on Twitter at www.twitter.com/PennDOTNews and like the
department on Facebook at
www.facebook.com/PennsylvaniaDepartmentofTransportation and Instagram at
www.instagram.com/pensylvaniadot.

To view a complete list of District 6 News Releases: Click
http://www.penndot.gov/RegionalOffices/district-6/Pages/allnews.aspx

To unsubscribe click
http://www.dot.state.pa.us/penndot/districts/district6/d6media.nsf/unsubscribeform?OpenForm