Postscript : Old Bridge Still Awaits New Span

There are Pierre Boulle’s “Bridge Over the River Kwai”; James E. Michener’s “The Bridges at Toko-Ri”; Simon and Garfunkel’s “Bridge over Troubled Water”; Lloyd, Jeff and Beau Bridges; the captain’s bridge, and London Bridge falling down.

Then there’s the Bonsall Bridge, a graceful, arched 60-year-old concrete bridge on California 76 that spans the San Luis Rey River nine miles east of Interstate 5 in North County.

It’s one of only two bridges of its design and construction still standing in Southern California--the other is in the Los Angeles area--but state highway officials want to build a new one as soon as possible.

The 667-foot-long Bonsall Bridge is structurally sound but only 24 feet wide--so narrow that truck drivers often wait for oncoming truck traffic to pass rather than meet it on the bridge. It’s considered a safety risk to motorists.

Back in March of 1983, Caltrans announced that the old bridge would be torn down unless someone wanted to adopt it, in a bureaucratic sense, because for the state to receive federal bridge construction money, it had to give up ownership of the old bridge first.

The County of San Diego came to the rescue, agreeing to maintain the bridge as a pedestrian-bicycle-horse crossing of the river once Caltrans no longer needs it.

Construction of the new, 1,200-foot-long, 43-foot-wide bridge, to be built about 400 feet upstream, was to be completed by this year, they said back in 1983.

But nothing has happened yet, and motorists are still driving across the old Bonsall Bridge.

It’s not that the state doesn’t have the $4.5 million to build the new bridge and the highway approaches to it.

The problem this time is a migratory songbird--the least Bell’s vireo--which nests only in the southwestern part of California and is proposed for inclusion on the federal endangered species list.

The bird nests in riparian habitats--like the one directly under where the new bridge is to be built. Alas, construction of the bridge is delayed until a replacement habitat is provided to accommodate the bird’s nesting needs.

John Rieger, Caltrans’ district biologist, says his office proposed two solutions: to plant appropriate bushes and trees farther upstream on the San Luis Rey River or to establish nesting grounds in Guajome Regional Park to the west in nearby Oceanside.

In either case, the new habitat would be twice as large as the one that would be lost to the bridge.

The other question is, how long should construction on the bridge be delayed while the new habitat establishes itself and matures?

Both issues are being considered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and an answer may be known within a month, Rieger said. It is possible, he said, that a new habitat may require as much as a two-year head start before bridge construction begins.

Don Rosbaugh, Caltrans’ project engineer, said bids may be sought on the construction project by late this year or early 1986. Construction will take about two years--once the question about the bird’s habitat is resolved, he said.

But Rosbaugh admits to being a bit confused by the county’s romantic notions of saving the old Bonsall Bridge.

“What’s the use of saving a bridge you can’t use?” he asks. “If people get their jollies driving out there to look at it, I guess that’s fine. But that’s not my kind of bridge. I like the Golden Gate Bridge and the George Washington Bridge, and those old steel truss bridges you find back in Pennsylvania--the ones that are riveted together. Now, those are bridges.”