PROVIDENCE — It’s a tale of two bridges.
The Washington Bridge amounts to a cautionary tale, with the December 2023 closure of its westbound span snarling traffic, siphoning money from local businesses, spurring litigation, and sparking pointed questions about why the bridge problems weren’t discovered and addressed sooner.
The Iway bridge, by comparison, amounts to a success story, with the relocation of Interstate 195 providing a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to free up 26 acres of prime real state in the middle of Providence, the capital city, for new development and new uses.
The stories of both bridges were told on April 30 when the The Big Dig podcast from GBH rolled into Providence as part of its “Highway Teardown Tour” for a live taping in collaboration with Globe Rhode Island.
Ian Coss, host of the The Big Dig podcast, and Edward Fitzpatrick, host of the Rhode Island Report podcast, spoke with Michael P. Lewis ― former director of Rhode Island Department of Transportation and of Boston’s Central Artery Tunnel Project (The Big Dig) — and Zachary A. Cunha, former US Attorney for Rhode Island who led the questioning during a legislative oversight hearing about the Washington Bridge.
The event took place in the CIC Providence space on the second floor of 225 Dyer St., a location Lewis noted was right where a ramp to I-195 used to stand before the Iway bridge went up to the south.
Lewis said the Iway bridge, which opened in stages between 2007 and 2009, addressed “transportation deficiencies of the existing highway system,” including a left exit on I-95 onto I-195 and “some crazy close proximity of on and off ramps.” But the project also opened up 26 acres in the heart of the city, providing 7 acres for open space and 19 acres for new development, he noted.
Lewis said he had not been back to Providence since 2015. “It’s very different, and I’ll admit, it took me a while to get my bearings,” he said. “I’m really pleased with what has happened.” He said state leaders, city officials and advocacy groups “produced something that I think Rhode Island and Providence should be really proud of.”
Lewis said he was “very pleased” with the Michael S. Van Leesten Memorial Bridge, a $22 million pedestrian bridge spanning the Providence River.
Originally, plans called for removing the concrete piers from the Providence River that held up the old I-195 bridge, he said. But eventually officials realized they could save money by leaving the piers in place and use that money for a pedestrian bridge, he said.
“After a lot of much gnashing of teeth, the result is out here,” Lewis said. “And I think it’s an anchor to the whole corridor, and I think it does bring more activity further down the river and expand the footprint of the city.”
Coss noted the Iway project cost $610 million — a fraction of the $24 billion spent on Boston’s Big Dig, including interest. But Lewis said the Boston project was far larger and more complicated than the Iway, which he said some called “The Little Dig.”
Cunha, who served as US attorney for Rhode Island from 2021 to 2025, now works in the Providence office of the Boston-based law firm Nixon Peabody. In November, he grilled former Department of Transportation Director Peter Alviti Jr. after legislators hired him to lead questioning during an oversight hearing on what happened to the Washington Bridge.
Cunha said that “as a Rhode Islander, as a taxpayer, and as somebody who spent a lot of years investigating fraud, waste, and abuse,” his takeaway from that hearing was “the persistent lack of oversight with respect to this bridge.”
The testimony, he said, raised the question “of whether what happened in December of 2023, when the bridge was closed, had to happen, had to happen the way that it did, had to happen with the impacts that it did.”
Cunha said he was surprised that during the hearing Alviti could not identify the statewide program manager who oversees the entire bridge inspection program.
Alviti testified that it was not the job of state officials to “second-guess” companies that inspected the Washington Bridge over the past decade, some of whom apparently failed to catch critical problems with the structure.
Cunha said his response to that line of reasoning is: “Respectfully, why are you there? What is the purpose of a Department of Transportation? If the only purpose of an entity is to let contracts and pay out money, then why do you need engineers? Why do you need all of this staff?”
In his proposed state budget, Governor Daniel J. McKee has proposed adding two new positions in the Department of Transportation to oversee private contractors and review their reports.
When asked if that will give the department the internal capacity it needs, Cunha said, “Is the director going to know their names? I think adding capacity is a start, but all of these things are not just about a job position. They’re about a culture. They’re about responsiveness. They’re about a desire to conduct legitimate good faith oversight. So I think it remains to be seen how this plays out.”
The state has sued 13 companies that have designed, inspected or done construction work on the bridge on behalf of the state.
Cunha said he asked Alviti “about the fact that each and every one of those contractors continues to do work for the state of Rhode Island.” He said, “I think, again, this goes to that question of cultural change, and is that concerning, and as the head of an agency, is that acceptable to you?”
Cunha said a report has shown that the Washington Bridge’s tie-down rods didn’t break on the day in December 2023 when the bridge was closed. He said other evidence has shown that those bridge component probably broke at least six months earlier, he said.
“That obviously raises some significant concerns,” he said.
Lewis and Cunha spoke at the event six days after a cement wall — called a parapet — and a steel shield for electrified wires broke off from the side of an I-95 ramp and fell onto Amtrak railroad tracks in Cranston, disrupting service between New York City and Boston.
Cunha said he has no idea if there are other parapets in danger of collapse in Rhode Island. “But what I do know is that there’s a through line through all of these things, which is the adequacy of inspection and oversight,” he said.
The Rhode Island Report podcast is produced by The Boston Globe Rhode Island. To get the latest episode each week, follow the Rhode Island Report podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and other podcasting platforms, or listen in the player above.
Edward Fitzpatrick can be reached at edward.fitzpatrick@globe.com. Follow him @FitzProv.