LANSING – A request for a proposal on construction of the Gordie Howe International Bridge between Detroit and Windsor will be issued soon, attendees at a forum on the proposed bridge were told Wednesday, with the selection of the project winner expected perhaps a year after that.
But with projected of construction of the bridge now in sight, some new issues have arisen in how the structure could affect both Detroit and Windsor.
Andrew Doctoroff, special projects advisor to Governor Rick Snyder, told the forum sponsored by the Institute for Public Policy and Social Research at Michigan State University that issuing the RFP was a top priority – the actual RFP will be issued by the Windsor Detroit Bridge Authority based in Windsor – but he did not know exactly when it would be issued.
Leading up to that issuance, Mr. Doctoroff said, the needed land acquisition is virtually complete in Canada. In the Detroit Delray neighborhood where the bridge’s U.S. point will be located, “hundreds of properties have been acquired,” Mr. Doctoroff said.
And “the legal and administrative machinery is operating at full throttle right now to assure the remaining properties are timely acquired and residences and businesses are relocated,” he said.
Once a project winner is chosen for the bridge, construction could start soon after that point, which would put construction underway in 2017 or early 2018.
Doctoroff said the bridge could be transformative to the region.
There are already, however, some concerns of potential effects with hopes the bridge could in fact be transformative for the specific region.
Zeenat Kotval-Karamchandani, an assistant professor of urban and regional planning at MSU, said one-third of the houses being purchased in Delray for the bridge are occupied by poor families, and even with the new bridge built, the area could remain in economic crisis.
A key consideration for the area will be ensuring that residents of the neighborhood get jobs working for the bridge once it is completed, she said.
And Bill Anderson, the Ontario Research chair in cross-border transportation policy at the University of Windsor, said that in Toronto, the Gordie Howe Bridge is already being referred to as the “Windsor Bypass.” It will be critical for Windsor officials and companies to use the bridge as an opportunity to develop new regional economic growth.
One item he discussed particularly was developing an intermodal center in Windsor, which does not now exist. In fact, Mr. Anderson said the only main intermodal centers near the bridge location are in the U.S., and one of the largest is in Ohio.
Doctoroff said officials are thinking all the time about the possible effects the bridge could have on local communities and how they could benefit. He called the thinking on the subject “robust and caring.”
