The Time Before the Bridge

A local landmark will be closing this week The North Dakota Department of Transportation will transfer traffic to the new Liberty Memorial Bridge this Thursday Only two lanes of traffic will be open It ll likely be an emotional day as the eighty-five-yr-old bridge is closed for good Brad Feldman talks to a man who lived through the time before there was a bridge connecting the two communities Take a look at this It s a picture from the State Historical Society of North Dakota showing the beginning stages of a pier for the Liberty Memorial Bridge It s just one of the many pictures in the collection showing the construction of the bridge It s a time in history Ed Lahr can recall Ed Lahr Remembering the Liberty Memorial Bridge I am going to have a memory of it being a great benefit to both Bismarck and Mandan and actually brought them into on city because it was quite and effort to get across Ed Lahr is ninty four years old His dad was in charge of the committee responsible for promoting the bridge Ed Lahr Remembering the Liberty Memorial Bridge They had to keep it moving and that was a pretty important addition to the area But before the bridge Lahr says moving across the Missouri River was slow Ed Lahr Remembering Liberty Memorial Bridge Highway ten was a forerunner of I-94 went right up to there and then you got on a ferry boat and went across the river You know where you turn and go down onto the bottems there on this side well that road went down into the bottoms and the ferry landing was right about where the intake of the water plant is Lahr says the ferry could only handle about four or five cars at a time He says at times it would take close to two hours to get across the river because of the long lines of vehicles waiting to get onto the ferry So when people in Bismarck-Mandan were able to see this it changed the landscape of the the Missouri River in the area Just like the new bridge will when it opens later this week Brad Feldman KX News As far as the new bridge traffic will be moved from the old bridge to the new bridge at eleven in the morning this Thursday Both bridges will be closed until four in the afternoon