Mr. Bill Emerson was an eight term Southeast Missouri Congressman who was most influential in securing the funds needed to construct the new bridge across the Mississippi River at Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and East Cape Girardeau, Illinois. After his death in June 1996, a contract was awarded for the construction of the bridge and funding was supplied by the Federal Highway Administration. Three days after his death, colleagues from the House of Representatives and the Senate unanimously passed legislation to rename the new bridge in honor of Bill Emerson and former President Bill Clinton signed the bill. The late Bill Emerson’s congressional seat is now held by his widow, Rep. JoAnn Emerson, and she has also followed in her late husband’s footsteps to ensure the completion and availability of this new bridge for citizens of Southeast Missouri, Southern Illinois, Western Kentucky, and Northwest Tennessee.

The new Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge was dedicated on December 13, 2003, seventy-five years after the dedication of the first Cape Girardeau Traffic Bridge on September 3, 1928. The construction of this cable suspension bridge used approximately 13 million pounds of reinforced steel, cables that stretch for 171 miles, 243, 688, 500 pounds of concrete, weighs 266 million pounds, each beam weighs 15 million pounds, and the bridge is 100 feet wide to accommodate the four lanes of traffic. The Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge is 4,000 feet long with the highway about 60 feet above the Mississippi River and the towers that hold the support cables rise another 300 feet above the highway. The bridge’s traffic is roughly 14,000 cars a day. An estimated 140 lights illuminate the bridge at night. The estimated cost of the Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge construction was $100 million dollars.