Snake River flooding Twin Bridges

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Story Published: Apr 24, 2009 at 4:52 PM MST

Story Updated: Apr 27, 2009 at 4:49 PM MST

By Steven Pope

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MADISON COUNTY - Not even a stone's throw away from Archer Highway, you can see Snake River is pretty full right now. But underneath the north side of what locals call "twin Bridges" there's a bottleneck and it causing concern that it's going to start wiping away part of the highway.

Just like it did back in 1997, when eyewitness news caught the bridge collapsing.

"The erosion continues year after year. It's obviously not solving itself and its not stabilized. Something has to be done to take care of the problem, instead of the symptoms," explains Robert Hansen, Madison County Commissioner.

This is rip rap. They've taken these rocks from a nearby quarry and placed them at the end of the bridge to protect it. but as you can see it's no longer needed. A flood back in 1997 changed the flow of the water, 70-percent of it used to flow under this bridge. That's now reversed, the north side of the bridge now has that 70-percent.

Hansen continued, "We got to split the water someway, for the flow to end up going back to the south."

For now they'll drop rip rap to help direct water away from the road. This will only fix the symptoms for now. They'll tackle the actual problem come Fall.

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