WORK ON CAPE SPAN MIGHT GET MAY BID

While alternative sources of funding are being pursued for the Mississippi River bridge project at Cape Girardeau, the Missouri Highways and Transportation Department has placed the project on its tentative bidding schedule for May.

Jim Murray, the department's Sikeston-based district engineer, said the state must secure federal funding by late March before accepting bids in May on the project. He said the $52 million bridge project was placed on the bidding schedule to give contractors plenty of time to consider it.

"This is all subject to change," Murray said.

The legislative director for U.S. Rep. Bill Emerson said the bridge project likely will disappear from the bidding schedule because funding probably won't be secured until early 1997.

"We will have field hearings throughout the remainder of this year and craft the legislation," David LaValle said. "I'm sure it will be a top priority of the 105th Congress and will be passed by the first part of the year."

LaValle said other sources of federal funds also are being pursued by Emerson's office.

"But it's unlikely that the other funding would happen," he said. "We don't have the legislative vehicle moving through Congress right now."

Missouri and Illinois each have pledged more than $6.5 million to the bridge project. The balance will be funded with discretionary federal money not yet appropriated.

Murray and his Illinois counterpart, Don Bridgewater of the Illinois Department of Transportation, said six months ago that both states have their funds in line for the project and that both are awaiting federal funding.

The bridge plans have been finalized and Missouri is moving ahead with the rest of the total project, new Route 74.

The first section of the total project, a four-lane highway between Sprigg and Kingshighway, was opened two weeks ago. It is a fraction of the total project that will provide a new link from Interstate 55 to Illinois at a cost of $85.7 million.