BATON ROUGE, La. – The Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) announced today that U.S. 190 at the Amite River Bridge will close from 9 a.m. to noon Wednesday, Oct. 21, to allow the contractor to demolish the metal portion of the old westbound bridge.

The closure includes a closure of both the eastbound and westbound lanes of U.S. 190 at the Amite River Bridge. The detour route is I-12.

This work is a part of a $29.5 million project to construct a new bridge on U.S. 190 over the Amite River. Each span of the new bridge will include two 12-foot lanes, a 10-foot outside shoulder, and a 4-foot inside shoulder. The new bridge opened to westbound traffic on Sept. 10. The new eastbound span is on schedule to be complete by December 2010.

For questions, or to sign-up to receive periodic e-mail updates on the project, contact DOTD’s Customer Service Center at customerservice@dotd.la.gov.

Learn more about the project by visiting the project’s Web page at www.dotd.la.gov. Click on "Projects" from the "Programs & Projects" section of the main menu on the left-hand side of the page and select the "U.S. 190 Amite River Bridge Project" link.

You can also follow the U.S. 190 Amite River Bridge Project on Facebook. Once you open a Facebook account, project information can be accessed by entering "Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development" or "U.S. 190 Amite River Bridge Project" into the search field.