Alaska kills infamous ‘bridge to nowhere’ that helped put end to earmarks

$400 million project became the symbol of Washington pork

Alaska officials have put the final kibosh on the infamous “bridge to nowhere” — a $400 million project tucked into the federal transportation plan 10 years ago that became the symbol ofWashington pork, spawned massive voter outrage and forever changed the way the government does business.

State officials concluded late last month that the project was too expensive and too extravagant for now, bringing to an end a 40-year push by locals in Alaska’s far southwestern corner to construct a permanent link between the city of Ketchikan and the airport that serves it.

“The thing that just ended it was the economy,” Ketchikan Mayor Lew Williams said after the state officially decided against the bridge, concluding that it made more sense to improve the ferry system that carries passengers from the mainland to an airport across a 1,000-foot strait of water.

The bridge was an “earmark,” or one of those projects lawmakers slipped into bills to direct money to politically important causes back home. But in the hands of opponents, the bridge became The Earmark — the worst of Washington waste.

“That was a big one. It just really hit the public consciousness. People could understand it — the bridge to nowhere,” said Sen. Jeff Flake, an Arizona Republican and prominent anti-earmark crusader who served in the House during the bridge fight.


Known locally as the Gravina Island access project, it was meant to be a permanent connection betweenKetchikan, with a population of 8,000, and Gravina Island, with a population of 50, but also home to the region’s international airport.

Alaska’s powerful congressional delegation, including the top House Republican on the Transportation Committee and the top Senate Republican on the Appropriations Committee, managed to secure more than $300 million in federal money through earmarks, which were the equivalents of line-item orders telling federal bureaucrats where to send the money.

For earmark opponents, who had been fighting a losing battle for years, the bridge was a gift — a project that amounted to nearly $8 million for every resident of Gravina Island. Keith Ashdown, then an investigator at Taxpayers for Common Sense, dubbed it the “Bridge to Nowhere,” and a crusade was started.

82-15 vote

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