Louisiana's most notorious bridge is being replaced: Will tolls help pay?

Louisiana's most notorious bridge, which the past two presidents have held up as a symbol of America's aging infrastructure, is finally on the cusp of being replaced to open what has become a chokepoint on Interstate 10 at Lake Charles.

President Joe Biden's Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg joined Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards in Lake Charles Thursday to celebrate a $150 million grant from the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure act passed in 2021.

"There's been a lot of waiting and a lot of promises, but talk doesn't build bridges," Buttigieg said. "President Biden and our leaders are delivering generational funding."

Their press conference was held on the lakefront with the Calcasieu River Bridge in the background, a narrow, steep 71-year-old white knuckle structure decorated with more than 5,000 iconic crossed flintlock derringer pistols on both side rails.

The $150 million federal grant brings the total in-hand funding to $800 million, about half of what is estimated a new bridge will cost.

Though pleas for a new bridge have rung out over the decades since the 1980s, there will be resistance to what will ultimately be tolls needed to meet the final cost of the bill.

"We are expecting there to be tolls," said Edwards' Transportation Secretary Shawn Wilson. "We just don't have another way to make up the difference."

The old bridge is rated 6.6 out of 100 by the National Bridge Inventory, but Wilson insists while the structure is outdated, it's safe, denying rumors that the Secret Service wouldn't allow President Biden to cross it when he visited Lake Charles in 2021.

It was built to have a 50-year capacity and carry about one-third of the 90,000 plus vehicles that cross it today.

Its reputation is national. In 2019, then President Trump promised if he was reelected, "We're going to build a new I-10 bridge (in Lake Charles)."

But the latest funding came post-Trump in the Biden-led infrastructure bill of which Republican Louisiana U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy was an architect.

"Securing funding for this bridge has been and will remain a priority," Cassidy said earlier this week. "Because I had a seat at the table Louisiana had a seat at the table and we were able to get this done."

Buttigieg, Edwards and Lake Charles Mayor Nic Hunter emphasized a new bridge will have a national impact, removing a bottleneck for commerce and travel.

"It impacts our supply chain for the entire country," Buttigieg said.

"This isn't just good for Louisiana but for the nation as a whole," Edwards said.

Wilson said he expects construction on a new bridge could begin within two years.

Greg Hilburn covers state politics for the USA TODAY Network of Louisiana. Follow him on Twitter @GregHilburn1.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Daily Advertiser: Pete Buttigieg celebrates funding to replace notorious Louisiana bridge