Total bridges
298
Public highway bridges in Sarasota County
County profile · official public datasets
Sarasota County, FL
298 public highway bridges tracked in the FHWA National Bridge Inventory: 57.7% rated Good, 41.6% Fair, 0.7% Poor.
- 298
- Public bridges
- 57.7%
- Good condition
- 0.7%
- Poor condition
The verdict
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory.
Sarasota County posts a top-quartile lowest Poor-condition share among rated counties in the state across mid-size county bridge inventory.
- Top 24%
- lowest Poor share in state
- 0.7%
- Poor-condition share
- 298
- public highway bridges
- 1982
- avg year built
Poor is an FHWA condition category from the lowest applicable component rating (4 or below), not a live crossing-safety or closure decision. Rankings cover counties with at least five public highway bridges.
Sarasota County Bridge Snapshot
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory, Sarasota County ranks #16 of 67 Florida counties with at least 5 public highway bridges on Poor-condition share (lower share ranks better; currently 0.7%). Sarasota County, Florida contains 298 public highway bridges. Roughly 57.7% are rated “Good,” 41.6% “Fair,” and 0.7% “Poor.” Poor means the lowest applicable deck, superstructure, substructure, or culvert rating is 4 or below on the 0–9 NBI scale. It is a condition category, not a live safety or closure decision.
Responsible agencies inspect covered bridges on risk-based intervals under current NBIS rules and submit inventory data to FHWA annually. The list below shows every NBI-tracked bridge in the county. Use the “Sort by” controls to change the ordering, and click any row for its reported inspection date, traffic count, and condition fields.
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory. See methodology for full definitions.
Good condition
57.7%
172 of 298 rated 7-9
Fair condition
41.6%
124 of 298 rated 5-6
Poor condition
0.7%
2 of 298 rated 4 or below
In-state Poor-share rank
#16 of 67
Among Florida counties with 5+ bridges, lower share ranks better
Condition distribution
Share of 298 NBI-tracked bridges by lowest applicable component rating.
Good 57.7% (172)
Fair 41.6% (124)
Poor 0.7% (2)
Sarasota County's Poor-condition bridges carry 16,044 vehicle crossings a day
That is 0.3% of the county's reported daily bridge traffic on 0.7% of its bridges: Poor-condition structures carry less traffic than their share of the inventory. Each Poor bridge averages 8,022 crossings a day against 17,324 for a Good-condition one. A Poor rating is a condition category, not a closure or a live safety judgement; it means the lowest applicable component rating is 4 or below.
Computed over the 298 of 298 bridges in this county that report an average daily traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
29.9% of Sarasota County's bridges have passed the 50-year mark
89 of the 298 bridges with a recorded construction year were built in 1974 or earlier. Age alone is not a defect: a well-maintained older bridge can rate Good, and 57.7% of this county's inventory does. Even so, this older cohort is the population from which future Poor ratings are drawn, which is why the age profile below matters alongside the condition split above.
Cutoff derives from the 2024 release year minus a 50-year design life. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
One structure carries 91% of the county's Poor-condition bridge traffic
SOUTH SUMTER BLVD. over COCOPLUM WATERWAY, built 2008, carries 14,600 vehicles a day, the most of any Poor-rated structure here. The county's Poor-condition exposure is concentrated rather than evenly spread, so the 2-bridge count understates how much of the daily burden sits on a single crossing.
Share is of the 16,044 daily crossings on Poor-rated bridges that report a traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
When Sarasota County's bridges were built
298 bridges with a recorded construction year, grouped by decade
- 1910s 1
1910–1919
1 bridges
- 1920s 5
1920–1929
5 bridges
- 1930s 2
1930–1939
2 bridges
- 1940s 1
1940–1949
1 bridges
- 1950s 23
1950–1959
23 bridges
- 1960s
1960–1969
38 bridges
- 1970s
1970–1979
60 bridges
- 1980s
1980–1989
72 bridges
- 1990s
1990–1999
37 bridges
- 2000s
2000–2009
32 bridges
- 2010s 22
2010–2019
22 bridges
- 2020s 5
2020–2029
5 bridges
What this shows Construction peaked in the 1980s, when 72 of the county's bridges still in the inventory were built, which is 24.2% of those with a recorded year. That cohort is now 35 to 44 years old in the 2024 inventory. Its average build year (1982) matches the Florida average (1983).
How Sarasota County compares with Florida's closest counties by inventory size
The 5 Florida counties nearest Sarasota County in number of bridges, with their condition splits. Its 0.7% Poor share is the 2nd-lowest of these 6. Its average build year of 1982 against a peer-group mean of 1983 is in line with the group.
Showing the 5 closest of 66 Florida counties eligible for comparison.
| County | Bridges | Good | Fair | Poor | Avg. built |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sarasota County (this page) | 298 | 57.7% | 41.6% | 0.7% | 1982 |
| Osceola County | 255 | 62.4% | 37.6% | 0% | 1985 |
| Manatee County | 254 | 55.1% | 44.1% | 0.8% | 1983 |
| Escambia County | 250 | 44.4% | 52% | 3.6% | 1984 |
| Brevard County | 249 | 51.4% | 47.8% | 0.8% | 1981 |
| Volusia County | 238 | 58.8% | 39.1% | 2.1% | 1984 |
Each share is of that county's own total tracked bridges; peers are the counties with 5 or more bridges whose inventory size is closest to Sarasota County's. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
Nationwide counties with similar inventory size or average build year
Two NBI-derived peer sets for Sarasota County, both outside Florida so the neighborhoods are not the same-state size table above.
Similar inventory size
Nearest county inventories outside FL (298 bridges here).
- Rutherford County, NC · 298 bridges
- Seminole County, OK · 298 bridges
- Richland County, WI · 298 bridges
- St. Croix County, WI · 298 bridges
Similar average build year
Nearest mean year-built outside FL (1982 here).
- Oklahoma County, OK · avg 1982 · 1,216 bridges
- Jackson County, MO · avg 1982 · 930 bridges
- Milwaukee County, WI · avg 1982 · 893 bridges
- Champaign County, IL · avg 1982 · 727 bridges
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release. Peers floor at 10 bridges so stub inventories cannot own the match.
Poor-condition bridges (2)
Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.
Related
Data sourced from official public datasets. See our methodology for details. Retrieved and formatted by PlainBridges
Every figure on PlainBridges is rendered directly from federal source data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page draws directly on federal source data, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. NBI condition categories reflect the latest reported inventory record, not a live safety, closure, or travel decision.