Barstow readies for construction of First Avenue Bridge

City of Barstow officials announced the groundbreaking next month of a temporary bridge next to the historic First Avenue Bridge.

The San Bernardino County Transit Authority announced that the North First Avenue Bridge over BNSF Railroad project will begin the first week of January. A groundbreaking ceremony for the project is scheduled at 10 a.m. on Jan. 26 at the historic Harvey House, which is located near the bridge.

The SBCTA and City of Barstow, in partnership with Caltrans District 8, will begin construction, with initial work that includes installing construction area signs, and clearing and grubbing the project corridor at the existing bridge and along First Avenue.

Construction will occur for approximately 18 months with work primarily scheduled from 6:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday.

The project’s interactive Google Map will include closures and detours in real-time and can be downloaded or bookmarked by visiting goSBCTA.com/NorthFirstAvenueBridge.

As construction of the permanent bridge takes place, a temporary bridge will be built parallel to the existing bridge, with the goal of not impacting traffic, the city stated.

Built with local, state, and federal funding, including SBC Measure I funds, the half-cent sales tax collected through SBC for transportation improvements, and Federal Highway Bridge Program funds, the project will include construction of new access roadways to the bridge, a new two-lane bridge, and the demolition of the old bridge once the new bridge is open to traffic.

New bridge

City of Barstow Engineering Services Administrator Domingo Gonzales said the new bridge would be modern and constructed with concrete, city officials said.

It will have a wider sidewalk on one side for a pedestrian walkway, 8-foot shoulders for bicyclists, and a lookout point to view the railroad.

The bridge will be approximately 1,179 feet long, with a width of 50 feet, which will expand to over 62 feet to accommodate a left turn lane that extends onto the bridge structure.

The bridge aesthetics will mimic the historic Harvey House with its antique lighting and architecture.

Groundbreaking of the bridge comes on the heels of the BNSF Railway's announcement to develop the largest railway hub in the western U.S. in Barstow.

Built in 1930 and modified in 1943, the North First Avenue two-lane steel and wooden bridge has served as a thoroughfare for several decades.

It was deemed a focal point of the railroad industry but no longer meets the structural and functional standards needed as the city undergoes a major railway industry transformation.

The city shuttered the bridge twice this year: From Jan. 12 to Feb. 4 after a head-on car crash damaged the structure, then again from Feb. 19 to March 16 after city officials said a single-car crash caused more damage and declared an emergency to fast-track repairs.

The bridge was declared structurally deficient and functionally obsolete years ago, and a worst-case scenario of First Street Bridge collapsing would endanger people and disrupt a significant railroad hub to unknowable degrees.

Railway hub

“As we gear up for the major BNSF Railway project, which will double our city’s population, this bridge replacement marks the beginning of the transformational change to our community,” said Barstow City Manager Willie Hopkins. “The bridge has served as the main thoroughfare for schools, hospitals, and other services, and the new one will be a mark of improved goods movement as we embark on enhancing our city’s infrastructure.”

BNSF Railway aims to invest more than $1.5 billion in a new Barstow facility that expands its role as an economic anchor in the High Desert and transforms the way global cargo moves across the U.S. from Southern California ports.

The private-railroad giant owned by Berkshire Hathaway Inc. announced its plans for a "Barstow International Gateway" driven by "clean-energy powered cargo-handling equipment" at an all-day event in October that celebrated Barstow's 75th year as an incorporated city.

BNSF said the project will span about 4,500 acres on the west side of Barstow with a new "rail yard, intermodal facility and warehouses for transloading freight from international containers to domestic containers," according to a company statement.

The company also predicts that this project will create 20,000 "direct and indirect jobs," though it's unclear how many will be in Barstow versus those at the two cargo-receiving hubs connected to the site, the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

In a statement, BNSF president and CEO Katie Farmer said, "The Barstow International Gateway will maximize rail and distribution efficiency regionally and across the U.S. supply chain and reduce truck traffic and freeway congestion in the Los Angeles Basin and the Inland Empire.

The current system of moving international cargo from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach centers on trucks hauling 40-foot shipping containers to warehouses in either Los Angeles or the Inland Empire, according to BNSF's website.

The goods in those containers are sorted and reloaded onto 53-foot containers, then trucked to a Los Angeles railyard to be transferred by train or driven by truck across the country.

This process creates inefficiencies and unnecessary truck trips within the Los Angeles Basin and Inland Empire," the website states.

The plan is for the Barstow International Gateway to change this by allowing cargo to be transferred from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach directly to Barstow via rail through the Alameda Corridor.

A rail facility would transport these containers to Barstow, where they would be moved onto trains across the U.S. The new intermodal facility would transfer containers between rail and "transload warehouses" using electric yard trucks.

The purpose of the transload warehouses would be for "repackaging and processing goods arriving at the Intermodal Facility from international containers into domestic containers," BNSF states on its website.

Three bridges slated for renovation

The new bridge is the first replacement in three bridges slated for renovation. The following two are over the Mojave River and the river’s overflow area. Construction of those will start in two to three years.

Hopkins said the bridges are one of several infrastructure changes that will take place in the city before BNSF breaks ground on its massive railway project, which was announced in October.

“A lot of positive changes are in the works for Barstow, and we are excited to see it all come to fruition over the next several years,” Hopkins said.

For more information, visit BarstowCA.org.

Daily Press reporter Rene Ray De La Cruz may be reached at 760-951-6227 or RDeLaCruz@VVDailyPress.com. Follow him on Twitter @DP_ReneDeLaCruz.

This article originally appeared on Victorville Daily Press: Barstow readies for construction of First Avenue Bridge