Ames will put its signature on another Mississippi River crossing with a recent project award to replace the Chester Bridge connecting Perryville, Missouri, and Chester, Illinois.
The Ames Team, including lead engineer Parsons Transportation Group, will design and construct a three-tower, cable-stayed bridge upstream from the existing truss bridge and shift traffic to the new structure.
One of the project’s goals is to reduce the frequency of flood-related closures of the crossing. The existing bridge, dating to the early 1940s, is the only motor-traffic bridge spanning the Mississippi River between St. Louis (57 miles to the north) and Cape Girardeau, Missouri (56 miles to the south), so a closure adds hours to the commute for local residents who live on one side of the river and work on the other.
The new 2,900-foot-long structure will be twice as wide as the existing bridge, with two 12-foot-wide lanes and two 10-foot-wide shoulders. The three-tower design will keep the tower heights below the FAA-regulated airspace of a nearby airport while providing two 850-foot spans to support marine navigation.
The existing bridge will be demolished once the new bridge is open to traffic. Additional work will include:
- Replacement of the Horse Island Chute Bridge, a 500-foot-long bridge that crosses a back channel of the river.
- 1.2 miles of highway realignment, improving roadway geometrics and safety.
Construction is set to begin in August and will continue through December 2026, with 75 workers on site at peak construction.