Chouteau Trafficway Bridge over the Missouri River in Kansas City, Missouri
The Chouteau Trafficway Bridge is located in Kansas City's East Bottoms, an industrial area. It is quite distant from downtown Kansas City and from population centers or residential areas on both sides of the river.It is very important to continue to develop this bridge and the routes connecting to it as bicycle- and pedestrian-friendly routes, in order to serve the population that works in the East Bottoms. Almost everyone who works in the East Bottoms lives elsewhere. Many workers in this area rely on walking, bicycling, or transit to get from home to job.
However, the bridge is unsuitable as a crossing point intended to be used by those crossing from downtown Kansas City, Missouri and North Kansas City. The bridge is simply too remote from those areas and, aside from the distance involved, the difficulty in getting from downtown KCMO or North Kansas City to the Chouteau Bridge is simply too great.
The bridge itself has wide bicycle lanes and is very friendly for the on-road bicyclist. Although there are no special pedestrian facilities, pedestrians who need to cross the bridge can certainly do so by using the wide bicycle lane/shoulder area.
However, the approaches and interconnecting roads leading to the bridge are very bicycle and pedestrian unfriendly at this time, as the photos below show.
Chouteau Trafficway Approach and Bridge
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Connection to the Bridge from the North on Chouteau Trafficway
Chouteau Trafficway north of the bridge is a narrow two lane road with no shoulder or pedestrian accommodations:
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Connections to the bridge from the South
This is part of Chouteau Trafficway south of the bridge. This is one of two roads leading to the south end of the bridge. Chouteau Trafficway has four twelve foot lanes and no shoulder. It has two long viaducts that cross railroad tracks. This viaduct originally had narrow (1.5 foot) "sidewalks" that have now crumbled:
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The other road leading to the south end of the bridge is Front Street. Front Street is a narrow two-lane road with no bicycle or pedestrian accommodations. It carries very heavy traffic and a high percentage of heavy truck traffic:
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