Report: State official warned of possible Cleveland bridge failure

CLEVELAND (AP) — A newspaper is reporting that a transportation official warned in a 2007 funding request that a Cleveland bridge was in danger of collapsing.

The Plain Dealer reported Sunday that Bonnie Teeuwen, a deputy director of the Ohio Department of Transportation, wrote that steel plates on the Main Avenue bridge were overstressed.

“Failure to repair these chords as soon as possible could result in the collapse of the suspended span,” Teeuwen wrote in a request to use $150,000 of district funds for emergency repairs, the newspaper reported.

Teeuwen says the alarming wording was necessary to get money quickly to seek repairs.

The outer lanes of the six-lane bridge were immediately closed to repair the structural steel.