The Francis Scott Key Bridge rebuild has been a primary objective for Gov. Wes Moore since the day it collapsed.

Its completion, however, will take years longer than originally forecast, and its projected cost has increased by billions of dollars.

The new bridge is now expected to open by the end of 2030 and cost between $4.3 billion and $5.2 billion — more than twice initial estimates — Bruce Gartner, executive director of the Maryland Transportation Authority, said Monday.

In the weeks after the structure was decimated by the wayward Dali container ship in March 2024, the state estimated the rebuild would cost between $1.7 billion and $1.9 billion. It sought to hire a builder, eventually selecting Kiewit, with a completion goal of Oct. 15, 2028.

But over the last several months, state officials shied from those projections. Skeptics, including President Donald Trump’s administration, had cast doubt on the projected speed and cost.

State officials said Monday that modern federal guidelines, increased costs of pier protection, and economic factors, including tariffs, led to the new projected cost.

“Just as families across the country are dealing with the reality of increased costs, so is Maryland,” Moore said in a statement Monday evening. “Trade policies out of Washington, D.C. have raised prices on everything — including essential materials we need in order to rebuild the Francis Scott Key Bridge. Still, despite this new economic reality, our resolve is unwavering."

Moore committed to working with Trump administration to find ways to reduce costs and build the new bridge faster.

U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen was key in getting Congress to fully fund the Key Bride rebuild, which he said was critical to making sure the project is completed “as efficiently as possible.”

“I know the state remains committed to ensuring any proceeds from the litigation go towards its completion,” Van Hollen said in a statement.

Maryland is involved in a lawsuit that seeks to hold the ship owner responsible for the bridge collapse.

In the immediate aftermath of the collapse, the state came up with cost and schedule estimates to access emergency federal funds, state officials said. That led to the initial figures, which Gartner described as “rudimentary.”

“I wish we’d had more time to come up with an estimate,” Gartner said Monday. “It was just a rock and a hard place for us.”

The bridge is now nearly 70% designed, which has given the state a clearer picture on the cost and timeline, he said.

Demolition of the bridge’s remnants started this summer, months later than originally anticipated, and preliminary construction activities recently began. Several vessels and cranes have formed a floating construction site, as crews test the durability of 220-foot steel beams that could become the bridge’s foundation.

Moore stressed last year the importance of building the bridge “on time and on budget,” and he regularly speaks about how he wants his administration to work fast and avoid getting mired in bureaucracy.

“I’m obsessed with going fast,” Moore said earlier this year during a visit to Japan.

The Key Bridge had come to symbolize that key tenet of Moore’s governing priorities. He has referred to the 11-week effort to remove the old bridge’s wreckage and reopen the port as a “remarkable success” of his leadership.

“I was there every single morning,” Moore said in Tokyo. “We project managed this thing, right, and it was able to actually get to a speed that no one thought was actually possible.”

In his statement Monday, Moore expressed disappointment at the new completion date while still committing to build the new bridge as fast as possible.

“While the timeline has shifted and is not what we initially hoped for, I have full confidence in our team,” Moore said. “They are working diligently to deliver a new gateway to the global economy that will endure for generations to come.”

As recently as July, Moore touted the speed of the rebuild efforts. Asked at a news conference at the demolition site whether government regulations or permitting had slowed construction, Moore said the opposite was true.

“We’re actually able to speed up the process faster than a project of this size and enormity could ever possibly imagine,” he said.

Bridges are often discussed and designed for years before actual construction begins. A potential replacement for the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, for example, was first studied several years ago.

That makes a surprise rebuild, in the case of the Key Bridge, especially challenging.

The new Key Bridge will be cable-stayed — meaning two huge towers will support webs of cable that hold up a roadway — and dwarf the previous one. Like the old one, it will be four lanes.

The bridge’s collapse on March 26, 2024, killed six construction workers filling potholes on the roadway. Debris in the Patapsco River blocked shipping to the Port of Baltimore for months.

The port has bounced back over the past year, but vehicular traffic in Baltimore must still reroute around the gap in Interstate 695.

Drivers have spent millions more hours on the road in the nearly 20 months since the collapse than they would have otherwise — and there won’t be reprieve until the span is completed.

“We know that this is going to be a significant update for the public. People that are driving through the tunnels are going to be experiencing, now, two years more than they were previously expecting,” Gartner said.

“We are asking for their patience and asking employers to help their employees navigate this process.”