Three of the four Lauderdale County bridges slated for closure by Gov. Phil Bryant’s April 10 declaration were repaired before the order, Road Manager Rush Mayatt says, and repairs on the fourth bridge finished Tuesday afternoon. 

The Mississippi Department of Transportation ordered Lauderdale County to close the four bridges on Thursday, following the declaration, which came after the Federal Highway Administration threatened to cut off funding to the state.

The federal authorities concluded in 2016 that the Office of State Aid Road Construction was doing too little to oversee how cities and counties examine local bridges. 

Mayatt said inspectors had reviewed the bridges in question in late 2017, either in October or November, returning their reports in mid-March. 

“We had four months where nothing was done because we were waiting on the inspection results,” Mayatt said. “Then, in two weeks, we were rushing to make repairs (after)… we get this report with their critical findings.” 

After receiving the reports, Mayatt said the county fixed three of the bridges within those two weeks: Greenhill Road, Buntin-Gunn Road and Snowden Road. 

“These bridges are probably in the best shape they’ve been in for years,” Mayatt said. “If the traffic’s monitored like it’s supposed to be, it should be years. But we can’t have a patrolman at every bridge weighing each truck.”

The fourth bridge, on Lakeview Golf Course Road, is technically property of the City of Meridian. Mayatt’s crews fixed that bridge because the county and city have an interlocal agreement that covers certain road repairs when the city doesn’t have the resources. 

Mayatt said the county didn’t receive a date for re-inspection before the governor’s declaration and left the bridges open. 

“(MDOT) called me and said I could close them or they would send their crews to close them,” Mayatt said. 

An inspector visited each bridge Monday and approved the repairs, Mayatt said.

Within 10 minutes of workers leaving the Lakeview Golf Course Road bridge, a white sedan drove across the new dirt, which Mayatt said will settle for about a weak (to identify ‘soft spots’ where the dirt will settle) before paving. 

Most of the bridge repairs had to do with splicing existing pilings, or the supports that hold the bridge. Over time, whether through settlement or other natural causes, some pilings had shifted and weren’t flush with the bridge. 

“Not all pilings have to be vertical,” Mayatt said, pointing underneath the Lakeview Golf Course Road bridge at a slightly angled post. “But if pilings get deteriorated to a certain point, they have to be spliced or replaced.”

Additionally, crews replaced the ‘runners’ supporting the guardrails and a few planks in the deck, which goes underneath the asphalt. 

Much of this confusion stemmed from a misconception some federal regulators have about local governments, Mayatt said, and a move away from timber bridges, roughly 103 of Lauderdale’s 309 bridges, to other, modern materials. 

“Some might think that we’re not doing a good job. That we don’t say, ‘Here’s a timber bridge in need of fixing, let’s find the funds,’ ” Mayatt said. “There’s really a move to get rid of timber bridges.”

With all four of those bridges back in use, Mayatt noted that only three bridges in the county remain closed: the Pickard-Campbell Road bridge, Woods Road bridge and Vimville-Causeyville Road bridge.