<p>The first phase of the new Mississippi River Bridge http://www.newriverbridge.org continued to take shape today when the Missouri Department of Transportation (MODOT)&nbsp; announced the selection of Crawford, Murphy &amp; Tilly, Inc., to design the Missouri interchange for the bridge.<br /><br />"As with the bridge design team, we had some outstanding proposals from design firms around the region," said Greg Horn, the MRB Project Director. "We are pleased to have such a distinguished team working with us and HNTB to complete this project."<br /><br /><img class="image-left" height="303" src="/images/uploads/st.-louis-bridge.jpg" style="float: left;" width="266" />As part of the selection process, interested design firms submitted a proposal. MoDOT and Illinois DOT engineers evaluated each proposal on a number of criteria, to include the firm's past performances, team experience and the team's understanding of the project's goals. The firms with the highest-rated proposals were then brought in for an interview with MoDOT engineers to help determine the best design candidate.<br /><br />Construction on the project could begin as early as 2010 and last four to six years.</p>