Buchart-Horn eliminated traffic jams with the new Star City Bridge Please click on the image above to see a larger version in a new window.

Great news Mountaineer fans! The Star City Bridge is open! Safer and wider, the new bridge eliminates a major bottleneck where US Route 19 (known locally as Monongahela Boulevard) crosses the Monongahela River. That section of roadway is the key connector between Interstate 79 and West Virginia University in Morgantown. Traffic problems at the Star City Bridge were particularly severe during Mountaineer home football games, since many fans from points north, west and south use Monongahela Boulevard to get to Mountaineer Stadium.

The highway crossing on the Monongahela River is just over 1,000 feet long with a 412-foot main span that carries Route 19 over a navigable waterway that is used for commercial shipping.

The West Virginia Department of Transportation's Division of Highways tapped Buchart-Horn, Inc. to design the new bridge and its alignment and instructed the firm to phase the project to replace the major highway bridge without closing busy Route 19 to the average 30-thousand motorists who depend on the river crossing every day.

That was accomplished by first constructing two lanes of new bridge, then removing the old one with explosive demolition last year and then constructing three additional lanes to replace the old blue two-lane steel truss bridge. Offering four highway lanes and a fifth lane for left turns onto Boyers Avenue, the new $18 million bridge also has pedestrian sidewalks. Creation of the new bridge required major realignment of the approach for proper right and left turn lanes as well as a five-lane approach roadway on the other side of the river.

Buchart-Horn, Inc.'s design for the Star City Bridge captured First Place honors in the large bridge category for the West Virginia Department of Transportation Division of Highways Engineering Excellence Awards for 2001.