The 80 year-old South Park Bridge that reaches across the Duwamish River is quickly losing its grip as 20,000 cars and trucks pass over and press down on its frail arms each day, leaving politicians, community leaders and area business owners and citizens biting their nails.

The bridge’s pilings for its two support piers were not driven down to glacial till when built, but rather on silty clay sediment. Over the course of the years, and with prodding by the Nisqually Earthquake, one pier moves up river, the other down river as a result of the mud.

The metal teeth where the two halves of the bridge meet are binding against each other and there are places where teeth are a mere paper’s width apart, instead of the proper three inches. Both towers are also tipping forward, moving toward each other.

Construction will no longer engage in costly, temporary repairs and the bridge may come down next year. King County Executive Kurt Triplett said the county will no longer fund maintenance.

Traffic would be routed to the already congested 1st Avenue Bridge. Architectural and logistical plans are on the ready for a bridge to be constructed a hair west of the existing bridge, but no funding has yet been identified.

“The end goal is to get the South Park Bridge replaced,” said Bill Pease, president of the five-year-old South Park Bridge Group. Pease is also office manager of the South Park-based Environmental Coalition of South Seattle, or ECOSS.

“We’re talking $155 million and we don’t have a lot of pull,” said Pease, a South Park resident, referring to the cost of a new bridge and the low-income neighborhood’s isolation and perceived lack of clout. "South Park is a really small community of 3,700 people, and it will be hard to keep businesses going here without drawing people from across the bridge.”

He pointed out that a lot of Boeing traffic utilizes the South Park Bridge because its plant is north of the Duwamish and its business park is south, in South Park. Boeing shuttle vans and trucks run all day long.

The Boeing lunch crowd and those from other nearby businesses fill Jalisco, Muy Macho, Napoli Pizza, Subway, Loretta’s, the local tavern, and other dining establishments along 14th Avenue South. That business would evaporate without a bridge.

Emergency response would also be hindered as emergency vehicles depend on the bridge.

“If we have a two-engine fire in South Park, the South Park and Georgetown fire departments respond, and the Georgetown department crosses the bridge,” said Pease.

“Most ambulances use the bridge when going to Highline or Harbor View as a way to avoid the 1st Avenue Bridge in ‘prime time’ in case it goes up because that bridge holds traffic a lot longer when a boat passes under compared to the South Park Bridge. Add 20,000 vehicles a day crossing the 1st Avenue Bridge and you will be stuck at that bridge for a long, long time.”

“We’re in a very competitive grant environment right now and are working hard to get that money for the bridge,” said King County Council Chair Dow Constantine, a candidate for King County Executive.

King County applied for $100 million from the federal Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery, or TIGER grant program for a new South Park Bridge.

Ironically, the bridge is competing with proposals from the city of Seattle that seeks $50 million toward the Mercer Corridor project. A decision on funding the bridge is expected by February.

“I met with a number of staff and with (State) Sen. Claudia Kauffman from South King County this week to work on laying out a strategy to piece together money from federal, state, and city sources," said Constantine. "One hundred and fifty million is a lot of money in this environment, but it’s got to get done. Now that we will have new leadership throughout the government locally we will have cooperation of our federal allies. We’re going to push it forward.

“I’ve been kind of the pied piper on this thing going around explaining to federal, state, and local officials the impact of this bridge,” added Constantine. “A lot of people are not familiar with this bridge and don’t know where it is. It suffers from being a little out of the way from most peoples’ travels but I think we have a very good argument that this is a critical link in our roads’ infrastructure and has to be funded. When you explain the purpose it serves, the impact it would have on Highway 99 mobility, for example, they start to perk up and listen.”