Part of South Range Line to close for bridge replacement

Get ready to rumble:

As of 5 a.m. Tuesday morning, Joplin’s Range Line Bridge over the Kansas City Southern Railroad will be closed for replacement.

This will create a traffic nightmare for the nearly 25 thousand vehicles that cross it per day for at least 3 months.

Contractor crews will remove the current bridge and replace it with a new structure that will be two feet higher and 15 feet wider than the current one.

The official detour map has traffic rerouted to Highway 249, 7th Street, 32nd Street, and I-44.

There will also be no left turns from eastbound 32nd Street on to Davis Boulevard, just east of Range Line.