Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott speaks at a prayer service at Mount Olive Baptist Church of Turner Station on Tuesday after the bridge disaster. On Monday evening, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott recalled the city’s difficulties in the past decade, including twin crises from violence and thepandemic that left the city reeling. The worst was in the past, Scott declared in a speech, and now the recovery was underway: “It will be hard, it will be long, but it will be worth it.
Russell Brehm, terminal manager for the trucking business Lee Transport, said he does not expect gasoline shortages even though much of the fuel in the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan region arrives on barges through the Port of Baltimore. They will divert to other ports, including Philadelphia, and use longer routes to deliver to the Baltimore area.
Maryland’s congressional delegation has already begun discussing methods to funnel federal dollars to Baltimore to aid in the recovery, Sen. Chris Van Hollen told The Washington Post. State officials are preparing to submit a request to the Federal Transit Administration’s emergency relief fund, which can provide both short- and long-term resources.
There will also be traffic delays regionally until a new bridge is built, which may be years away. Trucks moving hazardous waste or propane gas will no longer have a direct route across the harbor, because they are barred from using the tunnels that are the main alternative route for most traffic. Instead, hazardous material will probably be rerouted across the century-old Hanover Street Bridge or around the city’s Beltway, which will have spillover impacts on traffic around the region.