Talking Michigan Transportation

Mackinac Bridge Authority Vice Chairman Bill Milliken Jr. shares memories

• Michigan Department of Transportation • Season 6 • Episode 200

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On this week’s 200th edition of the Talking Michigan Transportation podcast, a conversation with Bill Milliken Jr., vice chairman of the Mackinac Bridge Authority and son of the state’s longest-serving governor.

Milliken talks about the honor and responsibility of serving on the Authority, including his role as chairman of the finance committee as they look to future needs and ensure appropriate revenue streams will be there.

He also shares his history with the Annual Bridge Walk and recalls walking with his father when he was governor. Gov. Milliken still holds the record for the fastest crossing among governors participating in the walk: 46 minutes, 50 seconds in 1971.

The Milliken history with the Mackinac Straits crossing concept predates the bridge’s construction by more than a decade. His grandfather, James T. Milliken, while serving in the state Senate, discussed the need for a bridge with then-Gov. Chase Osborn in the 1940s.

Jeff Cranson:

Hello, welcome to the Talking Michigan Transportation Podcast. I'm Jeff Cranson. This is, in fact, the 200th episode of the podcast. I certainly want to acknowledge everybody who listens regularly and appreciate it. I'm hopeful that you find something here of interest each week. I should also thank Randy Dubler, who engineers and produces the podcast and was a driving force in its creation and still is very helpful in tightening it and making it better each week.

Jeff Cranson:

Today, I'm speaking with Bill Milliken, who is vice chairman of the Mackinac Bridge Authority, lifelong Michigan resident, deep roots in northern Michigan, son of a Governor by the same name, Michigan's longest serving governor, as a matter of fact, and Bill has some great insights and thoughts about what it means to serve on the authority that oversees and protects our state's probably signature icon, the Mackinac Bridge. So, I hope you enjoy the conversation. So, bill Milliken, thank you again for coming on the Talking Michigan Transportation Podcast. I think it's your first time talking with us. I wanted to talk with you because of your role as vice chairman of the Mackinac Bridge Authority. Any given year it can be somewhat light duty and then other times it can be very challenging, but I know you take very seriously the responsibility to oversee and protect what is really our state's signature icon. So welcome and tell me what it means to you to serve on the MBA.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

Well, it's great to be invited to talk with you about it, and I'm certainly very proud of being appointed by the governor to be a member of the seven-member authority. My family and I have spent a lot of time on the bridge. The Labor Day Bridge Walk was something that I joined my parents for many times during Dad's 14-year term in office, so I feel like I've got a good sense of the bridge and the magnificence of it. One of the things that I missed recently is the fact that occasionally, when it was just a two-lane crossing, you used to occasionally see a Great Lakes freighter go underneath you and if you're on the grid looking through, you can look down on the deck of the freighter as it went through, and it was a magnificent vantage point on some of these thousand-foot vessels flying the Great Lakes.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, I hadn't thought about that. But in my first years walking, yeah, marine traffic was still allowed to navigate, so I saw that same thing and now, for obvious reasons, the Department of Homeland Security and Michigan State Police have advised against allowing that. While you know, anywhere from 25,000 to 30,000 people are walking on the bridge. So, yeah, that's a miss. Talk about those early days. I think when your father was elected governor, you probably would have still been a student. Did you bring friends along? Was that like a real treat to go up and do that?

Bill Milliken Jr.:

It was a family affair. I never invited friends of mine to join me. I guess I might have been able to arrange that, but it was me and my father, and sometimes my mother would be the Millican bridge walking delegation.

Jeff Cranson:

Did you have trouble keeping up, because your dad was always determined to set a record. In fact, I think he broke the previous record and once walked it in 47 minutes.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

I think that he wanted the best Governor Romney, and apparently has. Historically, I managed to keep up with him, but you knew you'd done something by the time you got to the finish line over there in Mackinac City.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, well. Well, you recently mentioned your family. History actually goes back deeper than your father serving as governor and walking it, probably each of those 14 years. He was Michigan's longest serving governor, so he probably walked the bridge more than any other governor too. But talk about going back a decade or so before the bridge was even built.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

Yeah, there's a family legacy there that I wasn't aware of for years. But Chase Osborne was an early governor of Michigan and he, as a matter of fact, he for four years he was the postmaster in Sault Ste Marie and prior to becoming governor, so it may account for some of his advocacy for a UP interest and a bridge to be built between the two peninsulas. My grandfather, james T Milliken, was serving in the Michigan Senate in the 40s and he and Governor Osborne established a relationship over the prospect of a bridge and advocacy for the construction of a bridge advocacy for the construction of a bridge, and it's one of the earliest records that I'm aware of of elected officials in government saying that, boy, we ought to do this bridge, and so I sometimes would love my grandfather to know that I've been appointed to a position on the bridge authority.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

He'd be very proud. Yeah, that's really cool, but it also says that you guys have a real legacy of public service in the family. We do, and I grew up with it and I'm doing my best to carry it on. People have asked me, well, when are you going to run for elected office? And to which I reply that I already hold an elected position as a trustee of Washtenaw Community College in Ann Arbor.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

I have no aspirations for higher office. I've been exposed to a lot of it but I think I'm comfortable with my station.

Jeff Cranson:

Well, you know, you and I have talked about this, and I think community colleges are more important than they've ever been in terms of the gap that they fill between traditional four-year universities and the skills and training that the modern workforce needs. So how does that, does that fit?

Bill Milliken Jr.:

at all with your interest in infrastructure and being involved in a bridge like this, in a bridge like this. I don't know how closely the two are tied, but on the community college side there is no shortage of gratification sitting at the trustee meetings, listening to the reports of students whose lives have changed and opportunities have opened for them based on the training we've been able to give them at the college. There are mothers who are able to get a home with their children for the first time. There are employment opportunities. The welding and nursing programs at Washtenaw Community College are on a waiting list Heavy demand for those, and the people who come out of those programs have ready employment opportunities in Michigan and widely. So that's been gratifying.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, I can see where that would be. Well, let's talk about your role as vice chair on the MBA and chairman of the Finance Committee. Is that right?

Bill Milliken Jr.:

That's correct.

Jeff Cranson:

yes, and finance is about the most important issue that there is when it comes to the bridge and its long term. We're self-supporting.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

yes, we manage the bridge and we run it on toll revenues that we collect from vehicles crossing the bridge.

Jeff Cranson:

Yes, and one would argue that user fees are the best way to fund transportation infrastructure infrastructure. So talk about that balance you have to strike between looking down the road at you know five years, 10 years, 20 years what the bridge needs and not raising tolls at a rate that you know really shocks people that have to use the bridge frequently. It's a lot you have to wrestle with.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

Well, and it's evolving. Pre-covid, crossing the bridge was a cash affair, but with the onset of COVID, for three or four years credit cards were mandatory because nobody wanted to handle currency. So people crossing the bridge can now either pay cash or they can pay us with a credit card, and so what used to be an all-cash business has now gotten more intricate. There are a lot of other bridges like ours that are credit card payments as well, so we're not alone in that. The long-term planning for the bridge is something that requires budgeting and engineering expertise, and we just finished painting the bridge a couple of years ago, and it took us about, as I remember, about seven years. That's a lot of steel. Interestingly, 90% of the Mackinac Bridge is underwater, so when you're looking at it from a distance and you're marveling at that span, you've got to remind yourself that that's just 10% of the work that went into this bridge when it was constructed in 1950, beginning in 1954. So there's a lot to it.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, I think when you see those photos of when the bridge was built and the cofferdams and the things that they had to do in that era, with the technology of the time, you know, in the mid 50s, in order to work underwater and go so deep into the bedrock so that the bridge could last as long as it has, it's amazing, it's truly a feat it has. It's amazing, it's truly a feat. You've probably learned some things without being a civil engineer about bridges and infrastructure and just the need to paint. I mean, was that a question of yours? When you first came out on the board and they said, hey, we've got this painting project going on. It's going to take seven years, were you thinking why do you need to paint the bridge?

Bill Milliken Jr.:

Well, I'm glad nobody asked me how long it should take, because I never would have guessed seven years. One of the pieces of inspiration that I had when I joined the Bridge Authority I got David McCullough's book on the Brooklyn Bridge. It's a great book.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

And the Brooklyn Bridge actually paved the way for a lot of the engineering and technique of the construction. It was a suspension bridge. Brooklyn Bridge is only a mile long and they have oh what 40 million cars a year crossing the Brooklyn Bridge, so they're about 10 times what we do on the Mackinac Bridge. But the cables the suspension cables on the Brooklyn Bridge are the same technique, the same cables that we used on the construction of the Mackinac Bridge. So there's a lot of linkage between the two and it's been interesting to realize how some of those engineering principles are consistent.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, those guys that conceived and built the Brooklyn Bridge in the mid-19th century were incredible visionaries and incredible geniuses and it's really. I mean, just as I can't fathom what it was like to build the Mackinac Bridge in the mid-50s, I can't imagine what it was like to build the Brooklyn Bridge then. But McCullough's book I've read it also and it's very good, pretty much like everything David McCullough does.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

One of the interesting aspects of that book I thought was they're dealing with the bends for the first time and how medically. What was required for decompression when people came down off the river bottom and there was one of the laborers in the Brooklyn Bridge had a severe case of the bends and was hospitalized and it was a critical situation and so they relocated him to another hospital where they felt they could better address it. You may remember this that it was Walter Reed who was the physician, as in Walter Reed Army Hospital that treated this case of kind of a freak accident at the time, and his son actually had to take it over and finish it.

Jeff Cranson:

Yes, stay with us. We'll have more on the other side of this important message.

Safety Message:

In Michigan. Safety comes first on the roads. To combat distracted driving, Michigan passed the Hands-Free Law. The law makes holding or manually using a cell phone or other mobile electronic device while operating a vehicle a primary offense. This means an officer can stop and ticket you for violating the law. This can include, but not limited to, sending or receiving a call. Sending, receiving or reading a text or email, accessing, reading or posting to social media sites or entering locations into the phone GPS.

Jeff Cranson:

With this law in place, drivers are encouraged to stay focused, keeping their hands on the wheel and their attention on the road. Drive smart, drive safe, drive hands-free.

Safety Message:

Michigan's hands-free law making the road safer for everyone.

Jeff Cranson:

So tell me, looking forward, I guess, beyond what we talked about in terms of weighing, you know tolls what do you see as some of the things you'll have to work through in the coming years with both the finance committee and the full board?

Bill Milliken Jr.:

One of the issues that the bridge authority is going to address is whether or not credit card fees that we pay when a driver comes through and pays the toll, whether those fees should be paid by the drivers or whether the bridge authority should continue to fund those themselves, and so that could affect tolls. The economics of that, the big picture, need to be examined and see what's a fair way to address that.

Jeff Cranson:

And you're talking probably as much as what two and a half three percent.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

Yes, I think the Secretary of State's office in Michigan has a two and a half percent fee. If I go to get a title or registration for a vehicle and I use a credit card, that's what I'll be asked to pay as well.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, talk about a fee. You don't see? I mean, we think we carry this piece of plastic and that's all there is to it, right?

Bill Milliken Jr.:

Yep, not so.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah. So what else do you think? I mean, that's certainly a big one. What else, I guess, what piques your interest? When you're at these board meetings and you're hearing these discussions and you're hearing bridge engineers talk about all they do, you see a lot of presentations, a lot of slideshows. What really I mean? The fact that you read McCullough's book shows that you've got some knowledge coming into this.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

But what piques your interest? Well, let me dip into another piece of history for a minute. When the legislature created the Mackinac Bridge Authority in the 50s, 1953, the Mackinac Bridge Authority in the 50s, 1953, the Bridge Authority was directed to begin interviewing engineers for the construction of a Mackinac Bridge and several engineering firms around the country were selected and Dr David Steinman, who ended up as the chief engineer for the Mackinac Bridge, went before the Bridge Authority and somebody asked him the Bridge went before the bridge authority and somebody asked him the question Dr Steinman, if somebody, one of these Great Lakes freighters, hits your bridge, what's going to happen? And without hesitation he said, the freighter will break into and sink. And that sort of characterizes the well, my word the overbuilt nature of the Mackinac Bridge. It has sustained several hits since by freighters and various craft and they come away the worst for wear and the bridge stands tall. So Dr Steinman was absolutely correct in his assessment of the strength of the bridge that he was going to design and the one that was built there.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, he didn't suffer for hubris, that's for sure. I remember in the book about the bridge he was also quoted talking about testing the depths into the bedrock, and you know for how deep they'd have to go to support the towers, and saying that they tested I think what was it to a thousand years, and then he was convinced that they could last to infinity.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

a thousand years and then he's convinced that they could last to infinity. And the wind tunnel tests? The bridge is inspected biannually by national engineering firms and they did a wind tunnel test several years ago on a model of the bridge and deemed it capable of withstanding up to 150 mile an hour winds. And we've had some pretty strong winds in the Strait of Mackinac but none have reached that level. But it's good to know that it's secure from that point of view as well.

Jeff Cranson:

Well, one of the things and my goodness, if your dad was around now and I know you're every bit as committed to sustainability and the environment as he was Nobody envisioned the warm the cycle being what it used to be in that part of the state. It got cold in November and stayed cold until April, and now it doesn't, and increasingly we have these thaws in January and February and huge chunks of ice are falling off the bridge and it has to be closed because of that, because obviously that's a safety concern and you know that's another expense. I'm sure you've been involved in some of the discussions about that.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

And it's an effort to adequately explain to motorists and truckers why they can't cross the bridge. They think it's a nuisance, but some of those sheets of ice are pretty heavy and there are windshields and body damage and all kinds of harm that could result if they actually got under one on its way down. So it's a changing environment but it's important that it's policed. The bridge has got surveillance cameras positioned all along the stretch so from the St Ignace Mackinac Bridge Authority office they've got a good ability to visually monitor what the conditions are out there. And it's carefully managed and there's nothing careless about it. It's all executed with precision executed with precision.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, there's no shortage of incredible commitment by both Kim Nowak and everybody on her staff the people that really take their role, working on again what I call the state's signature icon. They take it very seriously and obviously everybody in Michigan cares about that bridge. I mean we stamp it on our license plates. That's how big a deal it is right.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

You know, jeff, there's another aspect of global warming, too, tangential at any rate, which is the Straits of Mackinac don't freeze the way they used to, and, much to the dismay of our friends who winter over on Mackinac Island, they don't have as much access, or access that's as safe as it has been in the past to hop on their snowmobile and go over to St Agnes for shopping or dinner or whatever it is. So it's affecting lives all the way around.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, no, that's a huge factor and that's an area of the state and the country that you're going to see those kinds of impacts going forward, just like extreme weather events you know, more floods, you mentioned wind, certainly MDOT's wrestling with high water events all over the state and in an environment where we already can't fund what we need to in terms of roads and bridges, in an environment where we already can't fund what we need to in terms of roads and bridges, trying to build for a more sustainable network is just a greater funding challenge. Well, bill, what else would you want people to know about you and your work with the authority, or really just anything about your commitment to the state where you were born and raised and obviously care a great deal about?

Bill Milliken Jr.:

One of the things that I've been able to do several times is in conjunction with the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce Policy Conference.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

On the island, the Bridge Authority always invites members of the Senate House, elected members of the legislature, to come over to the office for a briefing on what we do and then invite them to go out and take a tower tour. And those that are interested and those that are willing, we'll take them up to the top of the South Tower to let them see from 650 feet in the air what Michigan's two peninsulas look like in one glance. And the procedure for doing so isn't it's not like climbing in an elevator to go to the top of the Empire State Building. It's a tiny elevator, it's dark and involves climbing some ladders when you get there. So it's not for the faint of heart, but it's been very meaningful to be a part of that tour and to get to know our legislators better, to make sure they understand what we are dealing with and we're trying to manage this state's largest asset dealing with when we're trying to manage this state's largest asset.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, I think it's a great idea to get them that up close and personal with the bridge and understand what it's all about, and that education has gone a long way for our relationships and their understanding. So, yeah, that's a really, really good point.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

When I was in grade school, my father, who was I believe he was in the he may not even have been in the Michigan State Senate yet but he invited me to drive to Mackinac Island, to Mackinac City, and take a boat over to the island for the day. He was going to meet Sophie Williams at the Grand Hotel and we got off on the dock in Mackinac Island and we boarded one of the wicker taxis. Many of our listeners may not remember what a wicker taxi is, but it was a bicycle with a wicker seat on the front for two people and an energetic bicycler in the back who rode you around the island wherever you wanted to go. And we took a Wicker taxi up to the Grand Hotel and had a meeting with Sophie Williams and then back down to the dock and back to Traverse City. And one of those Wicker taxis is still on display in the lower lobby at the Grand Hotel and I have to smile every time I walk by it. It brings back memories.

Jeff Cranson:

That's a great story. So that was a precursor to the pedicab that you see now in so many cities. Yeah, that's a great story. Now I appreciate talking to you and I appreciate that history. I know how much the bridge meant to your father and the family and I had wondered I wanted to ask you before, but I forgot about whether you had done any of those walks when he was governor, and I thought you probably did. So it must be pretty cool now to walk the bridge on Labor Day with another governor.

Bill Milliken Jr.:

Well, the bridge walk has evolved a great deal since George Romney and Bill Milliken walked it back in the day and, among other things, the considerations from Homeland Security and the Michigan State Police and new measures that we have for managing it and executing it safely. But the walk goes on. And what? 35,000 people last year. So we've got a success story on our hands.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, no, I think that there's a lot of gnashing of teeth about the changes, letting people start from each end and turn around if they want to, because of the timing, and it's worked out really well and, like you said, you know, it's allowed the tradition to continue. Things change, that's OK, but overall it's still working out really well. So well, thank you, bill. I appreciate you taking the time to talk with us. I'd like to thank you once more for tuning in to Talking Michigan Transportation. You can find show notes and more on Apple Podcasts or Buzzsprout. I also want to acknowledge the talented people who help make this a reality each week, starting with Randy Devler, who skillfully edits the audio, jesse Ball, who proofs the content, courtney Bates, who posts the podcast to various platforms, and Jackie Salinas, who transcribes the audio to make it accessible to all.