The wait is finally over for the re-opening of the Lane Avenue bridge. Today marks the grand opening of the 370-by-112 foot bridge.

“We are all excited to have the opening of the bridge, especially five months ahead of schedule,” said Gregory Payne, spokesman for the Franklin County Engineer’s office.

The reason for the early opening is because of a change in construction plans.

Originally, the bridge was to be constructed as pre-poured pieces, brought to the construction site, and then pieced together. The new plans called for the bridge to be poured on location, which resulted in the construction completing ahead of schedule.

“By pouring the bridge on-site, we were able to save a lot of time and money,” said Scott Roe, assistant bridge engineer and project manager.

“By changing the plans, we had complete control over the speed at which the bridge went up and we were able to set a much sooner date of completion,” he said.

The total cost of the project, $15.6 million, ended up being the same for the new plan as compared to the estimated total cost with the old plan. The difference, however, was how the extra money was used for other parts of the construction.

Payne said that the money saved by the on-site pouring was put back into the bridge by paying for additional construction hours, which moved the project along faster.

The opening ceremony will begin at 2 p.m. with a welcome by Dean Ringle, Franklin County engineer, and continue with a ribbon cutting and closing remarks. Speakers for the event will include Gov. Bob Taft, Franklin County Commissioner Dewey Stokes and OSU President Karen A. Holbrook.

Also participating in the festivities will be the Tri-Service ROTC Color Guard, the OSU Cheerleaders and Pep Band and the Holiday Inn on Lane Avenue.

The bridge has six 12-foot-wide lanes and two 12-foot-wide sidewalks, and will officially open for pedestrian usage a few hours before the ceremonies. Lane Avenue, however, will be closed to automobile traffic until Monday because of the home football game tomorrow so that equipment can be removed from the area.

Roe said that smaller detail jobs are the majority of what still needs to be done to and around the bridge.

“All that is really left of the project is to clean up the areas around the bridge and place some fabricated pieces of steel between each set of pillars for additional support,” Roe said.

“The temporary walking bridge and steel support beams under the Lane Avenue bridge will also be taken down and removed,” he said.

Once the area is cleaned up and the temporary bridges are removed, all that will remain stationary in the river will be the two support pillars for the bridge.

“The old bridge had three support pillars which sometimes caused problems with debris build-up, while this bridge only has two support pillars which will hopefully allow for better flow of the river,” Payne said.

A bike path that will run under the east end of the bridge, connecting the path behind Riverwatch Tower to the path that follows along the river toward King Avenue, is also being constructed.

The bridge project is part of a two phase plan to renovate the section of Lane Avenue that runs through the Ohio State campus. Phase one includes construction of the bridge and the upgrade to the intersection at Lane Avenue and Olentangy River Road. Phase two is the widening of the remaining roadway that spans between the bridge and High Street.

The section of road between the bridge and Neil Avenue is nearing completion, while the section between Neil Avenue and High Street will begin in the Spring of 2004.

With the Lane Avenue Bridge re-opening, traffic should decrease on Woody Hayes Drive allowing the Woody Hayes Bridge construction to conclude faster with less traffic problems and congestion.