I had some time to kill for a full day while out in Las Vegas recently, so I wanted to drive down to Hoover Dam and see the progress on the new by-pass route they're putting in to speed traffic between Vegas and Phoenix. U.S. Highway 93 is the prime route between the two cities - the largest cities in the U.S. with no direct interstate link between them, I was told. Because of security concerns and safety issues, trucks must go through Laughlin, NV/Bullhead City, AZ to cross over the Colorado River to get between the two cities. Even with a car, it takes a long time to get over the Hoover Dam hiking the drive time between Las Vegas and Phoenix.
It was a beautiful early January day when I drove down through Boulder City (see map) and down to the dam site. It had been 17 years since I was last at Hoover Dam, and that was when I was driving between Las Vegas and Phoenix to see my sister after CES. But I'd been hearing and reading about this new by-pass, including a bridge that's being built just south of the dam that will tower about 850 feet above the gorge below with a main span just short of 1100 feet. I had to go see this.
Now, I've never done the tour at Hoover Dam, and I know Cindy is dying to go there sometime and do just that. I told Cindy that sometime we'd go out to Vegas for a few days and go and do and see, rather than hang in town all the time. Death Valley would be a good place to go for a day. The Grand Canyon would be a healthy drive, but we could be there and back in the day. And we could go up to Mount Charleston for a taste of winter in the Nevada mountains.
Along the way to Hoover Dam, there's a number of great little turnouts and vistas to admire. I didn't take my camera along, but there's some pretty sights to see just outside of Boulder City along Lake Mead north of the dam.
And since I didn't have my camera, I couldn't take any pictures of the work in progress on the bridge when I got to the dam. I found some public domain pictures on the internet, however, including some at the Hoover Dam By-pass web site.
Here is a photo from the dam looking south and west to the Nevada side of the river. Initially, plans were to have the bridge built by 2008, but construction suffered a set back a year and a half ago when high winds toppled four cranes that were used to support a cabled crane system.
Here's a picture of the collapsed towers on the Arizona side of the river. Winds up to 65 miles an hour hit the site and blew down the towers. This set the project back by at least two years. They're now targeting the bridge to open sometime in 2010.
And here's a shot of the work looking north toward the dam. By the time the bridge is completed, it's expected to have 15,000 to 20,000 vehicles cross it each day. That's an increase of about five times the vehicles that cross the Hoover Dam on a daily basis.
This is an artist's rendering of what the Mike O'Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge will look like when it's completed. The bridge is named after former Nevada governor and decorated war hero O'Callaghan, and former Arizona State and Arizona Cardinals football player Tillman who gave up a multi-million dollar career in the NFL to go serve his country in Afghanistan. Tillman was killed in action in 2004.
Some people have said the by-pass bridge will detract from the natural beauty of Hoover Dam and it's surroundings. But I think the shear nature of the engineering feat and the classic look of the bridge will help accent the view around the dam area. It will be neat to see when it is completed.
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