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Max Guenther, a local architect, disagrees that the Lovers Lane bridge should be torn down as part of the Bonds to Bridges program due to its history.

Some worry history is lost with Bonds to Bridges program

Some worry history is lost with Bonds to Bridges program

Max Guenther, a local architect, disagrees that the Lovers Lane bridge should be torn down as part of the Bonds to Bridges program due to its history.

A handful of structures have been replaced through the city’s Bonds to Bridges program, but not all residents are pleased about seeing historic construction entirely rebuilt as part of the $20 million plan.

Ads touting the city of St. Joseph’s campaign in 2020 said the $20 million bond would be used for the repair and replacement of bridges throughout town. Max Guenther, a resident and architect, said he was misled.

“I think that the advertisement was giving me as a voter and other voters the impression that bridges like this, historic bridges on our historic parkway, were going to be repaired, they were going to be cherished and were going to be respected as part of our identity as St. Joseph citizens and not just ripped out and replaced with a cookie-cutter bridge,” Guenther said.

So far, every bridge in the program has been torn down and built new. Guenther wants to stop that from happening with Lovers Lane bridge since the St. Joseph Parkway is listed in the National Register of Historic Places and the bridges are referenced as contributing structures.

“The St. Joe Parkway and Lovers Lane are special places for the people of St. Joe,” Guenther said. “They’re part of our identity. It’s something that we have civic pride about and it sort of connects to a period in our past that we have good feelings about.”

Guenther recommends repairing the bridge, as the campaign ad describes, rather than replacing it. However, restoration is rarely that easy with a 100-year-old structure, a city official said.

“Restoration is kind of a slippery slope,” said Jake Fisher, the interim city engineer. “A good example of that would be the Missouri Theater we did several years ago. We started as a restoration project. Once the facade started to get removed, we found all these structural deficiencies. It just snowballed.”

While Guenther argues a repair could save the city and taxpayers money, the Missouri Theater shows it’s not always so simple.

“I’ve done renovation,” Guenther said. “You don’t know exactly what you’re going to find, but I think in this Lovers Lane bridge, in particular, there may be an opportunity to save money.”

The unique structure of the bridge is also a factor in replacing it.

“It’s a T-bridge,” Fisher said. “The reports from MoDOT in 2017 called for replacement. The T is the deck, so that’s basically the structure itself.”

The Lovers Lane bridge has some cracking and exposed rebar but is not nearly as bad as many of the other bridges along the Parkway that already have been replaced. However, Fisher said internally there are concerns.

“They’ve gone a hundred years,” he said. “That is a long time for concrete to hold up and the internal reinforcing steel is always a concern. Once that fails, the concrete around it fails.”

The bridge issue is a classic battle often fought in St. Joseph — preserve an old piece of history or replace it with something new.

“This Lovers Lane bridge shows up (in the ad) and it says repair or replacement,” Guenther said. “I never dreamed that that would have meant that it would be torn down and a new bridge stuck in.”

Quinn Ritzdorf can be reached at quinn.ritzdorf@newspressnow.com

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