Anticipated growth in the steel industry, and the potential to reduce traffic tie-ups on municipal roads, were the main factors that led to building the more than five-mile Cline Avenue extension, a spokeswoman from the Indiana Department of Transportation said Thursday.
Angie Fegaras said recommendations were made based on traffic projections made in the 1970s.
Construction on the Cline Avenue bridge began in 1979, according to INDOT. The 5.68-mile extension was built between Indiana Toll Road in Hammond and Chicago Avenue in East Chicago.
Chris Murphy, vice president of transportation for Indianapolis-based American Structurepoint Inc., said the extension would support truck and employee traffic from the interstate highway system to the industrial area along the Indiana Harbor and Ship Canal and the Hammond and East Chicago lakefront.
But a recession and industrial decline in the early 1980s helped short-circuit initial projections.
"What we found even after it opened up, the (80,000) to 100,000 vehicles per day never materialized," Fegaras said.
At peak daily traffic levels, only between 33,000 and 36,000 vehicles traveled that stretch of Cline Avenue, she said.
When building the bridge, the state also had to consider how high it needed to be to allow barges to continue being able to travel the canal. The bridge at its highest point is 110 feet to support barges that needed a 90-foot clearance, Fegaras said.