FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. — The East Gate reopens at 5 a.m. on Monday morning, after officials with Fort Leonard Wood’s Directorate of Public Works announced this week that the improvement project to the bridge outside the gate has been completed.
Hours of operation will be 5 to 8:30 a.m. and 2 to 6 p.m. weekdays.
The completion of this project — which modernized and improved the 80-year-old bridge that connects J Highway to the installation just outside the East Gate — helps ensure the safety of the Fort Leonard Wood community, said Dillon Barks, a DPW civil engineer for the project.
“On behalf of DPW, we want to thank you for your patience while we addressed the needed repairs at the East Gate bridge,” he said. “DPW’s goal in this project was to ensure a safe and sound structure, while also upgrading to the newest standards and safety features.”
Workers were initially tasked back in 2021, to mill and resurface the asphalt deck while also sealing the underlying concrete on the 420-foot-long bridge, but the scope of the project changed when officials noticed the amount of deteriorating concrete underneath, said J.D. Bales, chief of the DPW Engineering Design Branch.
“We knew there was water penetrating both the asphalt and the concrete due to spalling on the underside of the concrete deck,” Bales said.
Spalling is a term used to describe when concrete breaks into smaller pieces. In the case of the World War II-era East Gate Bridge, which crosses over the Big Piney River, water had — over time — damaged the structure.
Bales said the plan then had to be altered to include removing the deteriorating concrete and replacing it. The method of repairs that were selected for the bridge should be able to be maintained with very little impact on traffic in the future, he added.
“We now have a full-depth concrete deck,” he said. “The upgrades ensure one of the bridges people rely on every day to access the installation is safe.”
Social Sharing