DEP gives go-ahead for new Highlands bridge

Highlands bridge

SEA BRIGHT - The state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has approved a controversial plan to replace the 75-year-old drawbridge that links Sea Bright and Highlands with a fixed span.

The agency said the state Department of Transportation (DOT) can go ahead with its plan to demolish the existing bridge and construct a new bridge provided the DOT agrees to conditions set by the DEP.

In a letter dated May 25 to Richard Hammer, DOT assistant commissioner, Amy Cradic, assistant commissioner of the DEP, said that a response to the conditions set by her agency must be received within 60 days of her letter, which outlines the conditions.

"If you agree in writing that all the conditions are acceptable and will be met, the undertaking may proceed," Cradic said.

"If you do not respond within 60 days or do not agree with all the conditions, I must, by regulation, deny your application."

The borough councils of Sea Bright and Highlands have passed resolutions opposing the bridge replacement, and a local citizens group, Citizens for Rational Coastal Development, has retained an attorney to block the plan.

The DOT application to the DEP for permission to demolish the bridge has been held up because an advisory board of the DEP, the N.J. Historic Sites Council, recommended that the DOT's request be denied, stating that the new bridge, which would be 30 feet higher than the existing one, would have an adverse effect on the views from and to the Twin Lights, a National Historic Landmark.

The Historic Sites Council also said that the permit application did not show that a rehabilitation of the existing bridge would not be "prudent and feasible, thereby avoiding the adverse effects to Twin Lights."

In January, the DEP temporarily denied the DOT application and asked for additional information concerning the project.

In her May 25 letter, Cradic set four conditions for approval of the plan, including that a salvage plan for the "decorative elements on the existing bridge that can be conserved or re-used shall be submitted to the NJHPO for review and approval."

The NJHPO is the state's historic preservation office.

The letter also said that the "color of the new bridge should be similar in color to the existing bridge."

In addition, it is required that the DOT "shall include representatives of the NJHPO in any preconstruction meeting(s) with the selected contractor," as well as allowing the historic preservation office site visits "to inspect and comment upon demolition and construction of the project."

And the DOT must submit to the historic preservation office "the status on satisfying the conditions of this authorization" and requirements from an August 2005 memorandum, in a quarterly report, until the conditions are fulfilled, the letter said.

- Liz Sheehan