Houston Parks Board has good news to share about the MKT Bridge!
The plan documents needed for the additional repairs to address damage caused by the August 2020 fire have received expedited approval by the City of Houston and Harris County Flood Control District. With this necessary step now complete, Houston Parks Board continues to move forward with repair work to this vital trail connection.
On-site construction on the bridge is expected to resume in March, after steel is fabricated for the repairs. Construction is estimated to be complete in late Summer 2022, weather permitting. The current detour will remain in place until construction is complete.
We are working diligently to restore the bridge as quickly as possible. We sincerely appreciate your continued patience and we will continue to share updates as we have them.
See here for the previous update in September. The original schedule had this reopening by the end of summer 2021, so it’s been awhile. The Chron has some reactions.
By September 2021, more than a year after the closing, the parks board — a nonprofit that in the interim opened its signature Buffalo Bayou Trail Park on the southeast side of the bayou at the bridge — confirmed the damage was more severe than initially believed and said it would have to redesign the repair work and seek new city and county flood control permits.
Many bicyclists and Heights runners grumbled for months that the bridge — comparable for cyclists to what the Pierce Elevated along Interstate 45 is to automobile drivers — never would have stayed closed for months if it carried cars and trucks.
On Jan. 1, to mark the 500th day since the bridge closed, BikeHouston executive director Joe Cutrufo urged parks officials and city leaders to “bring the same urgency to this bike and pedestrian bridge that they would bring to any other transportation project.”
News of the upcoming work was celebrated — albeit wearily — by some riders.
“Jesus Christ, finally!” cyclist Noel Espino, 33, said in an email. “They mean it this time, right?”
I’m just glad it’s finally happening. I’ll be even more glad when the connection from the White Oak Trail to the MKT Trail is done, too. That was supposed to have started last fall and be done in “early 2022”, but as yet I’ve seen no action on it. Perhaps this was waiting for some progress on the MKT Bridge repairs as well. Just please, get it all done.