Letter: Richland doesn’t need Duportail bridge

A few years ago a lady I worked with asked if I had noticed the “cut out areas” across the Yakima river from Duportail street in Richland. When I told her I hadn’t, she said that her dad, who worked for the city of Richland, said that since Richland built the city shops in the Queensgate area they would be building a bridge across the river to access the shops. I hadn’t heard anything about this at the time.

Turns out he was right. After all the back-room dealing, and the public’s refusal to fund this, the city wants to raise the license fees on vehicles to pay for the bridge that was never approved by the citizens. It has taken a few years, but the city still wants that bridge.

Out of curiosity, we checked the mileage from the Duportail light on the bypass to the light at the city shop in Queensgate. It is 2.9 miles. It seems like the city of Richland can drive that distance easily instead of imposing a $20 fee on every registration of every vehicle in the city.

This story was originally published February 17, 2017 at 4:23 AM with the headline "Letter: Richland doesn’t need Duportail bridge."