Coast Guard halts Ambassador expansion plans

DETROIT — Plans to twin the Ambassador Bridge have been put on hold after the U.S. Coast Guard terminated the Detroit International Bridge Company’s (DIBC) bridge permit application.

Bridge owner Matty Moroun has been planning to build a new span across the Detroit River connecting Detroit and Windsor, Ont., but a land dispute with the City of Detroit near the project’s site has, for the time being, suspended the project.

In a letter to Dan Stamper, president of DIBC, the U.S. Coast Guard says it is returning the permit application to the bridge company because land rights where part of the construction would take place still belong to Detroit.

The Coast Guard also mentions that the City of Detroit has indicated they are unlikely to convey those land rights to the bridge company.

DIBC submitted a permit application to the Coast Guard in July 2006 to construct a new six-lane bridge parallel and adjacent to the existing bridge. Before construction could begin, a Coast Guard Bridge Permit was required because the proposed structure crosses a navigable waterway.

This is not the first letter of abeyance DBIC has received from the U.S. Coast Guard.

Last June, the coast guard ordered DBIC to stop construction of a new Customs plaza and toll booth lanes on both sides of the border because the permit application process had not been completed.

The DIBC said at the time that the move "smacks of retribution" for a federal lawsuit filed earlier by the bridge company against the U.S. Department of Transportation over its plans with Canadian governments to build a separate, public bridge crossing a few kilometers downriver.

And just last month, a U.S. Judge ordered the demolition of a newly constructed duty free store and gas pumps on the Detroit side of the Ambassador Bridge because, the judge ruled, the structures were illegally built on city owned property.

At the end of its letter, the U.S. Coast Guard says it will review a complete application from DBIC if resubmitted.