MILTON-FREEWATER, Oregon – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Walla Walla District issued a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) to grant Section 408 permission for the Birch Creek Road Bridge Replacement on the Walla Walla River in Umatilla County, Oregon, about three miles northeast of the City of Milton-Freewater, Oregon.
The Section 408 permission granted to the Milton-Freewater Water Control District applies to a request by the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) to replace the Birch Creek Road with a new bridge span approximately 175 feet south of the existing bridge. ODOT plans to alter the levees by constructing new bridge abutments and new approaches to the bridge structure. In addition, ODOT plans to install six H-piles for temporary support of the new bridge span during construction. The old bridge would be removed and its abutments would remain as part of the levee system.
Because the levee structures were constructed by the Corps, these actions require Section 408 permission, pursuant to 33 United States Code Section 408, for potential alteration to a Corps-constructed river improvement (public work).
The Corps solicited public comments on its draft FONSI March 8-22, 2017. The Corps’ signed FONSI and environmental assessment (EA), with appendices, and the ODOT’s Birch Creek Road Bridge project fact sheet are available on the Walla Walla District’s Environmental Compliance webpage http://www.nww.usace.army.mil/Missions/Environmental-Compliance/.
For more information about the bridge project, please contact the ODOT Region 5 project leader at 541-963-1365.
-30-
Release no. 17-058