Ohio State Senator Tim Schaffer spent last Thursday touring various local townships and municipalities with County Engineer Mark Eicher as they visited sites of bridges funded by Ohio’s Bridge Partnership program.

The program began in 2013 through an amendment that Schaffer helped introduce, which provides funding to counties and municipalities for roadway bridge replacement projects.

Schaffer highlighted the work of Eicher and his team in “doing a great job with limited resources,” as the county has the tenth highest count of bridges in the state, with funding that often doesn’t match.

According to Eicher, the county has benefited greatly from the bridge partnership program as the average structure, which is often almost entirely state-funded, costs between $300,000 to $400,000 dollars with an estimated lifespan of 50 or more years.

Schaffer said the visit was extremely educational and highlighted the importance of critical infrastructure, especially in rural areas that don’t necessarily have the local tax base larger counties do for the same or more road miles.

“It is amazing how the forces of nature–weather, wind, rain, floods–even human traffic with cars and trucks, take their toll on bridges and contribute to the deterioration of man-made structures,” said Schaffer.

According to the Muskingum County Engineer’s website, the county has over 420 bridges throughout its nearly 430 miles of county-maintained roadways.