The price tag to rebuild Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge has blown past early projections, with Maryland officials now warning the final bill could exceed $5.2bn and the reopening pushed back to late 2030—a full two years later than originally promised.
The Maryland Transportation Authority (MDTA) said revised estimates reflect sharply higher material costs, new federal resilience requirements, and a massive pier-protection system designed to prevent another catastrophic ship strike. The updated cost range—now $4.3bn to $5.2bn—is more than double the $1.7bn to $1.9bn estimate issued just days after the bridge’s collapse.
“This project isn’t just a local rebuild, it’s vital to our national economy,” said Samantha Biddle, acting transportation secretary and MDTA chair. She noted the new bridge’s protective fenders will each be larger than a football field, while the extended main span and deck height are required to accommodate today’s larger ships and updated engineering standards.
Officials stressed that those early cost estimates were produced in less than two weeks—an unusually compressed timeline—so Maryland could secure urgent federal emergency funding after the disaster. Since then, both inflation and construction-market volatility have surged, with US highway construction costs climbing around 72% in five years, according to federal data.
The bridge collapsed on March 26, 2024, after the containership Dali suffered two catastrophic electrical failures and lost propulsion, drifting into a major support pier. Six construction workers were killed.
Maryland continues to pursue the ship’sowner and manager for damages, arguing gross negligence, with any recovery intended to offset federal emergency spending. There are multiple other legal cases surrounding the accident which closed much of the port for many weeks.
Attention now swings back to the cause of the tragedy. The National Transportation Safety Board meets today to determine the probable cause of the Dali’s loss of power and the subsequent fatal bridge collapse.
