If you’ve tried to buy,
well, anything in the last couple years, you’ve probably heard something like this
The global supply chain isn’t functioning as it normally does.
You can’t find lumber to build a new home, you can’t find products to stock the shelves.
Now, you might be picturing busy ports in California, or of course,
the Ever Given wedged in the Suez Canal.
But a major bottleneck in the supply chain is actually right here
at the border between the US and Canada.
The bridges that connect Windsor and Detroit are some of the most
important bits of infrastructure in the region.
In fact, they’re so important that there’s a kind of
quiet competition underway to build the best one.
The newest bridge on the block is the Gordie Howe International. Pushing the
bounds of engineering, it’s set to become the longest cable-stayed bridge in North America.
But this is more than just a crossing. It’s also a business opportunity,
because yes … bridges can make money. And there’s a lot of money to be made here.
This is how one construction project is transforming the US-Canadian border.
The US and Canada have the largest trading relationship in the world. In 2021,
Canada overtook China as the US’ top trading partner, exchanging $664BN worth of goods.
Nearly a quarter of that trade happens here.
Detroit is a huge automaker, so a lot of vehicles and auto parts are shipped back
and forth, along with things like cosmetics, vaccines and even blood
Every day more than $300 million worth of goods travel between Windsor and Detroit.
That means a lot of taxes and tolls are being paid on bridges like this.
That toll revenue often goes towards paying back the cost of construction
and maintaining the structure.
But while most toll bridges were taken over by state highway departments in the 20th century,
there are still a handful of toll bridges owned by private companies.
Like the 92-year old Ambassador Bridge, just a couple miles away from the new Gordie Howe.
It’s been privately run since 1929, and was taken over by billionaire Manuel Moroun in the late 70s.
Today trucks pay $45 just to cross it.
And there are a lot of trucks that cross the Ambassador Bridge.
In 2021, an average of 263 trucks crossed the four-lane bridge
every hour. On particularly busy days, it’s more like 500 trucks an hour.
All of that traffic is good for business, but not so much for travel time.
And that’s where the Gordie Howe Bridge comes in.
Originally proposed nearly two decades ago,
it’ll provide an alternative to the overcrowded Ambassador Bridge.
And getting it built is a massive undertaking.
The project is divided up into four main components: roadwork at a new interchange
in Michigan, the US point of entry, the Canadian port of entry, and of course the bridge itself.
Once complete it’ll be the longest cable-stayed bridge in North America,
stretching 853 metres across the Detroit River.
The $5.4BN project is expected to finish in 2024. But it hasn’t been an easy path to get here.
There’s been one major roadblock along the way.
Remember Manuel Moroun, the guy who owned the Ambassador Bridge? Well, he also owned
the duty free shops at the end of the bridge and tunnels – because why not own it all?
Moroun made a lot of money off this trade corridor, and he didn’t want
someone else taking potential traffic away from his empire.
So when a new bridge was proposed back in 2004, he did everything he could to stop it.
He sued the governments of Canada and Michigan to try and block its construction.
Instead of a new publicly owned bridge,
he came up with the idea of building a second stretch of the Ambassador Bridge, which he would own.
He spent millions of dollars trying to pass a ballot measure that would make it harder
to get the bridge approved, but the measure didn’t pass.
He even ran a cable TV advert asking then-President Trump to block its construction.
After nearly two decades of battles, Moroun’s efforts failed, and construction began in 2018.
The next year, Trump allocated $15 million in federal funds for the Gordie Howe bridge.
For all the time and effort that went into the political fight,
the engineering challenge of actually building the bridge still lay ahead.
The structure will be held up by a series of cables fanning out
directly from two main towers, which will bear the weight of the road.
Now, that’s different from a suspension bridge,
where the cables spread out across a suspender between the towers.
For a while, suspension bridges were the go-to choice for mid-length crossings in
America — think the Golden Gate or George Washington Bridge.
But as cable-stayed bridge design became cheaper,
quicker and more efficient, it began to make a comeback.
The Gordie Howe bridge will be anchored by two
massive towers on opposite sides of the Detroit River.
Soaring 220 metres in the air,
the towers are designed to resemble the curvature of an ice hockey stick.
It’s fitting, given this is Canada, and the bridge is named after a legendary hockey player.
The towers are set to be some of the tallest structures in the region.
But before building up, the crew had to drill down.
To create a stable base for the towers, they dug six drill shafts deep into the
bedrock below each tower leg, and then filled them with steel wires and concrete.
From there, they built the base of the tower and started working their way up.
Now because the towers are so tall, there’s a system of hydraulic pipes
used to pump concrete from the ground all the way to the top of the structure.
The head of the tower will have steel anchor boxes surrounded by concrete,
which will hold the base of the cable stays.
The cables will then be strung from the top of the tower directly to the road deck.
The main section of the bridge will be built over the water using something
called the unbalanced cantilever method. Here’s how it’ll work.
Starting from the towers on the shore,
segments of the bridge will be added on one at a time until they meet in the middle.
At the edge of the road, a crane will place steel
girders and floor beams to form the base of the road.
Then pre-cast concrete slabs are added, and fresh concrete is poured on top to fuse them together.
Finally, a crane will lift the cables from the road deck and secure them to the top of the tower.
That process is repeated until both sides connect in the middle.
Each section can take up to 12 days to install, and everything can be transported
over the bridge itself, so there’s no need to move anything through the water below.
Once complete, there will be six lanes of traffic and a path for pedestrians and cyclists.
This project comes at a crucial time for American infrastructure,
as bridges all across the country are reaching the end of their lifespan.
The Gordie Howe Bridge is an impressive feat of engineering, but better yet, it has the
potential to shape one of the most important border crossings in the world.
Maybe all that political drama will finally be water under the bridge.
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