MEMPHIS, Tenn. — The I-40 Hernando de Soto bridge fully reopened Monday after being closed for two and a half months. That's news to celebrate for West Memphis, but city leaders said the headaches of the closure are not over yet.
"West Memphis is back open for business," Mayor Marco McClendon said.
During the months of the closure, McClendon said businesses felt the drop in business, with fewer people making the trip from downtown Memphis into West Memphis.
Now, they're seeing businesses begin to rebound.
“I just think with this westbound lane that is open, all the business is coming back," McClendon said. "All of the businesses are coming back real strong. I went to get breakfast at Chick-fil-A and their line was around the block. That’s a good sign for those businesses as well as the tax generation for West Memphis.”
While people are returning to the east side of the Mississippi River, there's still work to be done from the bridge being closed.
All the traffic being detoured through West Memphis led to some trucks taking detours of their own through neighborhoods, adding more damage to residential and service streets.
The city reports gutters were broken, street corners were smashed, and yards were torn up by semis making wide turns.
McClendon said some of the streets were already in bad shape but made worse by the heavy loads of the trucks not meant to travel on them.
“They need repair," he said. "Some of these streets were already in need of repair - but when you take a commercial truck, and we love truckers, but just not in the community. But you have trucks with that much weight going down these streets already in need, that definitely brought a lot of harm to those streets.”
He said his office is asking for state and federal help to get repairs made to the streets. McClendon said he supports a third bridge being built and hopes a bipartisan infrastructure can be passed by the Senate.