BIXBY, Okla. — A new bridge across the Arkansas River in Bixby moved another step closer after Governor Kevin Stitt signed House Bill 2123 into law.
2 News Oklahoma has followed this story over the last few months, as the bill made its way through the legal process. HB2123 gives the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority wider authorization to build that bridge somewhere near Bixby.
People we've talked with in the past call it a long time coming.
"We've got this out here building up. We've got Riverside kind of building up. I think it would just help kind of tie those together a little better," south Tulsa resident Shawn Williams said.
So as the bill became closer to law, people naturally got excited. But as we followed this story, city leaders preached caution.
"It does not set a date for construction. It is not saying we're going to build a bridge now," Bixby Mayor Brad Girard said. "It says we are going to get the process started."
OTA spokeswoman Lisa Shearer-Salim laid out the next steps now that Governor Stitt signed the bill.
"This has been a community request for a long time, and it's a complicated product in that it requires a lot of significant partnership and ability to be able to connect this bridge to local infrastructure," Shearer-Salim said.
OTA says this bill doesn't specify the exact bridge location. We reported in April the boundaries, somewhere between Delaware Avenue and as far east as 161st East Avenue in Broken Arrow.
The new crossing will also likely be a toll bridge. Shearer-Salim says it'll be part of what they call the cross-pledge network.
"So, it would not be a stand-alone toll bridge," Shearer-Salim said. "As part of our system, it allows us to provide a probably much better toll rate than what it would have standing alone."
And of course, the big question is the timeline. OTA does what they call a feasibility study, partnered with the impacted cities, determining both cost and the best location for a bridge. That could happen before the end of the year.
"There's just a lot of coordination and planning and work that needs to take place to see a project like this come to fruition," Shearer-Salim said. "These things don't happen by themselves."
Shearer-Salim added that the toll system is 50% funded by out-of-state drivers, which she says takes some of the burden off our taxpayers.
TJ Eckert is your South Tulsa County reporter.
Is there something you think he should know about or look into?
You can email him at TJ.Eckert@kjrh.com.
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