An iconic piece of south Sarasota County history may have a less expensive path to preservation.
A report by a Michigan company that specializes in restoring historic bridges said that it would be less expensive to rehabilitate the century-old Blackburn Point Road swing bridge than replace it.
The review by Nels Raynor, president of St. Johns, Michigan-based Bach Ornamental & Structural Steel was released Sept. 13 by the Sarasota Alliance for Historic Preservation.
Raynor estimated that rehabilitating and maintaining the bridge would cost about $17 million through 2043, based on county figures. That estimate excludes a temporary bridge an engineer recommended for the repairs, which could add $10 million. Even at roughly $27 million, the total would be
below the county’s projected $65 million to $70 million cost for a replacement bridge.
The SAHP listed the swing bridge among its 2025-26 Six to Save list of endangered historic structures.
The Blackburn Point Road Bridge is the last of three swing bridges that once connected Sarasota County’s mainland to barrier islands.
The bridge is 9 feet above the bay and only offers boats a swath of water 51 feet wide on the Intracoastal Waterway to pass from Little Sarasota Bay to Dryman Bay.
Those two characteristics create navigational deficiencies that make it impossible to replace the bridge with an exact replica, but the existing structure can be restored.
Sarasota County is now deliberating what to do with an aging structure that is both beloved because of its historic charm and woefully inadequate for daily use because it is too narrow to accommodate traffic in both directions, let alone bicycle lanes and sidewalks.
A project design and engineering study conducted by the engineering firm Hardesty & Hanover considered a no-build option, with ongoing maintenance and repairs scheduled for the historic bridge, along with either a replacement swing bridge or replacement draw bridge.
A Sarasota County spokeswoman said via email that the Sarasota County Commission is tentatively scheduled to discuss the study in November.
She added that the county is continuing to evaluate and compile information on all options.
What is the history of the swing bridge?
Sarasota County contracted with the Champion Bridge Company of Wilmington, Ohio, in February 1925 to buy three prefabricated swing bridges to connect the mainland to barrier islands — one on the south side of Siesta Key and two connecting to Casey Key.
The Blackburn Point Road Bridge opened for vehicular traffic on Dec. 15, 1925.
It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in March 2001.
Dubbed the “Flying Bridge” by many, the bridge has also appeared in at least three movies, “Hoot” in 2006, “Out of Time” in 2003 and “Palmetto" in 1998.
Raynor noted that the state of Florida’s historic-bridge records show it is one of only seven bridges of its type and one of only two single-lane swing bridges in the state.
Why was the Michigan-based specialist contacted?
The Sarasota Alliance for Historic Preservation has long voiced concern that the county has only paid lip service to rehabilitation of the existing bridge.
“We believe Sarasota County staff has focused on replacing the Blackburn Point Swing Bridge without giving rehabilitation the serious consideration it deserves,” Jan Vertefeuille, co-president of SAHP, said in a prepared statement. “Before a decision is made about the future of this historic bridge, we want commissioners and the public to have a clear understanding of whether it can be preserved safely and cost-effectively.”
That prompted the preservationists to work with local residents to bring in Bach Ornamental & Structural Steel.
The company was not paid for the report.
Raynor admits in his report that Bach Steel is an interested party because it restores structures like the Blackburn Point Road Bridge for a living.
“The financial case is not close,” Raynor said in a prepared statement. “The county’s own engineers acknowledge the bridge can be restored and rate it in fair condition.”
“Rehabilitation is the fiscally conservative option, by a wide margin.”
To support that, Raynor’s report relies on Sarasota County’s current numbers that anticipate more than $6 million in repairs in 2028 with a projected cost of $11 million in maintenance until roughly 2043 to arrive at a cost of $17 million.
That estimate does not include a recommendation by Hardesty & Hanover engineer Jim Phillips that the existing bridge should be removed so those repairs could be conducted off-site, on land — which would necessitate spending another $10 million for a temporary bridge.
Still that ballpark cost of $27 million is less than the $65–$70 million Sarasota County projects for a replacement bridge.
What is the status of the bridge?
In a 2025 video posted by Sarasota County on YouTube, Sarasota County transportation structures engineer James Stock explained the current condition of the Blackburn Point Swing Bridge.
In the video, he pointed out corrosion holes in plates and members of the bridge that are "fracture critical,” which is a term used by the Federal Highway Administration to describe an area that if a fracture did occur, the bridge would be closed.
That video can be found at youtube.com/watch?v=SqSrP55OOZY.
Raynor, in the executive summary of his report, addressed areas highlighted in that video.
As Raynor went on to discuss four issues raised by Sarasota County, the first thing he did was question the use of the term “fracture critical,” which Stock frequently uses.
Raynor first noted that the term “fracture critical” was retired because it is misleading.
“The Federal Highway Administration formally retired this term in 2022 precisely because it misleads the public into thinking such bridges are unsafe to use,” he continued. “Thousands of nonredundant steel bridges carry far heavier traffic than Blackburn Point every day.”
He also challenged the assertion that loss in the “bottom-chord” section of the bridge condemns the truss.
Raynor noted that “The bottom chord is the one member that always corrodes first, for predictable reasons, and it can be replaced in kind without harming the bridge’s historic integrity — because the replacement is indistinguishable from the original and the design is unaltered.”
Raynor then challenged an assertion made by Stock that deterioration of gusset plates — thick, flat metal sheets that connect structural beams or girders at a single joint — could lead to collapse similar to the 2007 collapse of the I35-W bridge in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
“The I-35W bridge collapsed because of an original design error — gusset plates built too thin in 1965,” Raynor wrote. “Blackburn Point has no such defect.”
“Corroded plates are an in-service maintenance item, replaceable in kind, and replacing them restores the original capacity,” he added.
The last issue Raynor addressed involved the fact that bridge members are exposed to vehicle impact.
He noted that modern deck-mounted guardrails can protect the bridge trusses “without transferring impact energy to it.”
Earle Kimel primarily covers local governments in Sarasota County as well as land development and environmental issues for the Herald-Tribune. Follow him on Facebook and X. He can be reached by email at earle.kimel@heraldtribune.com. Support local journalism by subscribing.
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Saving Sarasota County’s historic swing bridge could cost less
