Maryland is facing a future of financial straits when it comes to funding transportation projects. For those concerned with crossing those straits and about promised projects yet to be completed, the inspiration of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, undergoing potential updates of its own, stands tall as an example.
The 350-foot plus bridge, first opened in 1952, changed life for those in the state, opening not just roads between the Western and Eastern Shores, but avenues of opportunity for those previously stranded on one side or the other of Maryland before the structure was built.
A page on the Maryland Transportation Authority website calls the bridge “a dream in 1908, a financial impossibility in 1929 and a war-postponed plan in 1940,” and gives credit to the leadership of Gov. William Preston Lane Jr., for whom the bridge has since been named.
Now, that same project is in a second round of study for whether there needs to be new construction in the 22-mile-long, two-mile-wide corridor that includes the existing Bay Bridge.