Warren letter asks how Cape Cod bridges are hurting communities

Politics

Massachusetts officials have faced setback after setback in getting dedicated federal funding to replace the Sagamore and Bourne Bridges. Now, Sen. Elizabeth Warren is taking further action to get that money allocated.

A new letter from Sen. Elizabeth Warren is the latest step in an ongoing battle to secure funding to replace the elderly and deteriorated bridges that connect Cape Cod to the rest of Massachusetts.

To aid her in her quest to finally secure enough federal funding to replace the federally-owned Sagamore and Bourne Bridges, Warren wrote to local and state officials last week asking them how the bridges’ poor condition has impacted their communities.

“The Cape Cod Bridges replacement is key to modernizing Massachusetts’ physical infrastructure to meet the economic, social, and environmental challenges of the 21st century,” she wrote.

“As local stakeholders who live, work in, and lead communities surrounding these bridges, I seek your input as I press the federal government to live up to its commitments to replace the assets they own.”

What’s happened with the Cape Cod bridges’ replacement funding so far

The nearly 90-year-old bridges were intended to last 50 years, but have been undergoing continued maintenance for decades just to keep them standing.

The only roadways on and off the Cape for the more than 35 million vehicles that cross them each year, construction on the bridges has led to massive traffic back-ups for miles.

After two different studies on the Cape Cod canal and the bridges — one of which called the bridges “functionally obsolete,” the Army Corps of Engineers announced the decision to replace the bridges in April 2020.

But since then, Massachusetts’ officials have faced setback after setback in getting dedicated federal funding to replace the bridges.

Finally, in December 2022, the Biden administration awarded Massachusetts a $1.6 million planning grant for the bridges.

Biden followed that up with a much bigger commitment in March 2023 when he included a $350 million down payment for bridge replacement in his budget and agreed to transfer ownership from the Army Corps of Engineers to the Commonwealth. This proposal made it through the U.S. Senate on Friday.

Then, in May, Gov. Maura Healey doubled the amount of money the Commonwealth had pledged to the project from $350 million to $700 million.

In 2022 officials estimated that the project would cost $4 billion, so despite recent efforts funding for the project is still incomplete.

Warren’s letter

Warren begins her letter by highlighting the importance of the Cape Cod bridges, writing that they serve as the gateway for more than 260,000 Cape residents and about five million visitors annually.

“They are vital assets for the Cape Cod economy and surrounding communities, and also serve as essential routes for general transportation, tourism, and evacuations in case of an emergency,” she writes. “…The bridges’ structural deficiencies present an ongoing risk to the accessibility and economic stability of the Cape Cod region.”

Warren writes that she’s been working to acquire federal funding for the bridges since she took office in 2013. She says the urgency of the project is one reason she supported Biden’s bipartisan infrastructure bill, which guaranteed Massachusetts billions of dollars for infrastructure projects.

“The [replacement project] will ultimately result in new bridges that vastly improve travel conditions, meet modern safety standards for vehicle and
pedestrian traffic, and provide significantly improved multimodal travel,” she writes.

The senator says in the letter that local leaders have continuously spoken out about the negative impacts the decrepit bridges have on their communities. But in her letter, she asks them to write her back with answers to questions she believes will fully illustrate the problem.

Warren lists out seven questions that ask how the bridges have affected all aspects of Cape life, including tourism, working and living there, owning and operating a business there, and buying goods.

What’s next

The letter doesn’t include a list of recipients, but State House News Service reported that the letter went to “a series of elected state and local officials.”

The letter asks that the officials respond by Aug. 2. It’s unclear how the responses will be used, but it’s clear that Warren’s fight to get the Cape Cod bridges replacement project funded isn’t over.

“I remain fully committed to working with federal, state, and local partners until Cape Cod residents get the safe, secure public infrastructure they deserve,” she wrote.

You can read Warren’s letter in full below:

Elizabeth Warren’s Letter on the Cape Cod bridges by Susannah Sudborough on Scribd