Bradenton mayor wants Green Bridge to show its namesake color

MANATEE COUNTY — When people see the Green Bridge spanning the Manatee River, Bradenton Mayor Wayne Poston wants them to actually see the color green.

“I’d like to really make the Green Bridge green,” Poston recently told the City Council.

He did not refer to a new paint job but to a computerized light show similar to what the Florida Department of Transportation recently installed on the Sunshine Skyway on Tampa Bay and the John Ringling Causeway across Sarasota Bay. The city of Tampa illuminated bridges on the Hillsborough River, as have jurisdictions elsewhere in what is becoming a global trend.

Computer controlled LED lights beneath the bridges create splashes of color on the piers and columns that can be seen by drivers approaching the crossings and, in some cases, from miles away.