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Oversize, overweight trucks banned from I-10 bridge
By Jill Dunn
This photo, taken on opening day, shows the narrowness of the bridge's prefabricated sections.
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Although the Interstate 10 bridge over Louisiana’s Lake Pontchartrain reopened Jan. 3, oversize and overweight trucks must take an alternate route.
Permit overweight and oversize loads traveling between Slidell and New Orleans in either direction will have to take Interstate 55 and circle the lake, adding 59 miles to the trip. The I-10 twin-span bridge will remain closed to these truckers until the new twin bridge is built in about three years, said Lindsay Ruiz De Chavez, a state transportation department spokeswoman.
The two westbound lanes into New Orleans reopened to most traffic Jan. 6, eight days ahead of schedule. Bridge repairs started Sept. 12, two weeks after a storm surge during Hurricane Katrina knocked 435 segments out of alignment.
The bridge reopened with message signs and lower speed limits of 50 mph westbound and 60 mph eastbound.
Before Katrina, the 5.4-mile I-10 bridge averaged 55,000 vehicles daily. By Nov. 30, traffic had dropped to 24,420 daily on the two lanes of bridge that were open. Much of the detoured traffic apparently used the U.S. 11 bridge, which saw an increase from 6,700 vehicles daily before Katrina to 14,035 vehicles daily by Nov. 30.
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