Harbour Bridge Authority

SJHB Authority

From 1949 on, the Harbour Bridge was almost constantly under discussion, and plan after plan was considered and enthused over before drifting into limbo. The remarkable 1960s were to change the fabric of the city more than any events since the arrival of the Loyalists in 1783 and the Great Fire of 1877 – and bring the Harbour Bridge.

But as the 1950s ended, Saint John, gradually strangling in its own growing stream of traffic, was still wrestling with the age-old problem that was the heritage of Glooscap.

It started like so many previous efforts. The Common Council had called another meeting, in West Saint John this time, to discuss a Harbour Bridge. It was held in the West Side Community Hall.

The meeting was all in favor of a bridge and appointed a six-man citizens’ committee. The date was May 1, 1961.

This time was to be different.

Within two weeks, the committee had held its first meeting and appeared before Council with a proposal – a cross-city expressway from Chesley Street to City Road and a high-level, four-lane bridge in the Navy Island area of the harbour.

It asked the city for traffic, engineering and similar studies.

The studies were started, and throughout the summer and winter discussion grew. By the next spring, it became clear that neither the Province nor Ottawa would undertake to build a bridge, so the great decision was taken. The Legislature of New Brunswick was petitioned to set up an independent, seven-member Saint John Harbour Bridge Authority, charged with the responsibility to build, maintain and operate a toll bridge. The act was approved April 13, 1962.

Appointed to the Authority in July were five representatives of the city: Mrs. L. W. Bagnell, A. V. F. Duffy, Kenneth D. Dunn, Thomas L. McGloan and James A. Whitebone. The provincial representative, Dr. H. H. Peters, chairman of the 1961 citizens’ committee, and the federal representative, Harold F. Hopkins, were appointed subsequently, and on Oct. 29, 1962, the group met to organize and begin its task. Mr. Hopkins was elected as the first chairman.

There were long months of quiet study and noisy controversy over whether the Harbour Bridge or an urban expressway north of the city should come first.

In January, 1964, Saint John Common Council approved in principal a recommendation of the Board of Trade and the Port and Industrial Development Commission, in accord with the Harbour Bridge Authority, to set up a Joint Action Committee to work for a Throughway linking the Mackay Highway on the east with the St. Stephen-Fredericton highways on the west via the Harbour Bridge. Approval quickly followed from the then-independent City of Lancaster on the west side of the St. John River and the Parish of Simonds to the east of Saint John.

A few days later, an engineering study recommended a $10,000,000.00 toll bridge from Navy Island to Hilyard Reef.

Preliminary studies continued at an accelerating pace. By the end of 1964, the Authority had acquired its first general manager and the city had a detailed engineering feasibility study placing the cost of the Harbour Bridge at $18,000,000.00 as part of a Bridge-Throughway complex costing $25,000,000.00 or $26,000,000.00.

Property acquisition started in the spring of 1965 after the federal government undertook to guarantee bonds and underwrite the operation of the bridge until it became self-supporting through tolls.

Work was held up for a complete review of the planning by Ottawa in 1965, which resulted in a decision to go ahead. Expropriation of properties began in earnest in October 1965.

Meanwhile, the province and the federal Atlantic Development Board had undertaken to construct the Throughway.

Contracts for the four main piers were signed in September, 1965, the “closing the gap” ceremony as eastern and western ends were joined took place Nov. 20, 1967, and on Saturday, Aug. 17, 1968, the bridge was partially opened to traffic ahead of schedule, using the North End access and exit ramps, and on the 17th Sept. the entire bridge complex was opened to traffic.

The first travelers looked out on a city in transformation. The remarkable 1960s had brought a whole new outlook to the Loyalist City. But of all the changes, none is more dramatic, nor more striking, than the Saint John Harbour Bridge.