4 Rhode Island Bridges Rhode Islanders Refuse to Drive in a Storm
Wind gauges at Quonset Point spiked to 74 miles an hour on the morning of Feb. 22, 2026, a gust strong enough for the National Weather Service to call it Category 1 hurricane strength.
The Rhode Island Turnpike and Bridge Authority (RITBA) shut every major bridge over Narragansett Bay before the snow even started piling up.
Nobody argued with that call.
These are the Rhode Island bridges Rhode Islanders refuse to drive in a storm.
Note: This is general information, not legal advice. Wind-restriction levels and bridge closures are subject to change, so confirm current conditions with the Rhode Island Turnpike and Bridge Authority.
1. Newport Pell Bridge
RITBA closed the Newport Pell Bridge to every vehicle, not just trucks and trailers, starting at 7 p.m. on Feb. 22, 2026, as the worst of the blizzard bore down on Newport County.
Its towers rise 400 feet above Narragansett Bay’s open water, taller than the 285-foot towers on Mount Hope Bridge, the only other suspension span in RITBA’s lineup.
That’s a long way up.
RITBA reopened the bridge at noon once the statewide travel ban lifted.
A milder round of restrictions is common too.
RITBA grounded box trucks, tractor-trailers and RVs on this same bridge in December 2025, well before winds ever reached full-closure territory.
That Feb. 22 closure came after wind gauges at Quonset Point clocked gusts up to 74 mph that morning, the same reading the National Weather Service graded as Category 1 hurricane strength.
RITBA’s Four Wind Levels
The Rhode Island Turnpike and Bridge Authority grades wind risk on its bridges in four steps, not just open or closed.
At 30 miles an hour, high-profile vehicles get a caution advisory.
At 50 miles an hour, RITBA bans box trucks, trailers and RVs outright.
At 60 miles an hour, only cars, pickups, flatbeds and buses stay on the road.
Once sustained winds or gusts hit 70 mph, RITBA can close a bridge to everyone.
2. Jamestown Verrazzano Bridge
The Jamestown Verrazzano Bridge carries Route 138 over the West Passage of Narragansett Bay, linking Jamestown to North Kingstown across four lanes with open water on both sides.
RITBA named this bridge by name, right alongside the Pell Bridge, in a full wind-restriction alert once sustained winds crossed 60 mph on Jan. 17, 2022.
Only cars, pickups, flatbeds and buses got through.
Everything bigger waited.
It sat at the toll plaza until the wind eased.
RITBA repeated that closure during the Jan. 29-30, 2022 nor’easter, when a statewide travel ban grounded tractor-trailers and passenger vehicles alike.
Tractor-trailers were barred from 6 a.m. to 11:59 p.m.
Every other vehicle waited from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
The same thing happened again in the Feb. 2026 blizzard that shut down all four RITBA bridges at once.
3. Mount Hope Bridge
Mount Hope Bridge has carried Route 114 between Bristol and Portsmouth since October 1929, making it the oldest of RITBA’s four spans by four decades.
The next-oldest, the Pell Bridge, didn’t open until 1969.
Its deck runs just two narrow lanes, a 27-foot-wide roadway with no shoulder to pull into.
There’s nowhere to pull over.
RITBA fully closed the bridge, not just to high-profile vehicles, in a dedicated alert on Jan. 17, 2022.
RITBA issued that alert the same morning it restricted the Pell and Jamestown Verrazzano bridges to smaller vehicles only.
That much wind means something different on a two-lane deck built before the Great Depression.
4. Sakonnet River Bridge
Sakonnet River Bridge has connected Tiverton and Portsmouth since 2012, the newest of RITBA’s four crossings and a direct answer to a storm problem that goes back generations.
An earlier Sakonnet River Bridge carried traffic on this same crossing from 1956 until the current span replaced it in 2012.
Before that, cars used the old Stone Bridge about a half-mile south.
It took hurricane damage in 1938 and again in 1954 until the state closed it to cars for good.
Rhode Island learned early.
RITBA still shuts today’s bridge alongside the other three whenever wind readings cross its thresholds, including the Feb. 22, 2026 blizzard that closed all four at once.
The Emptied Island
Aquidneck Island depends on exactly three road bridges to reach the mainland: The Pell Bridge, the Mount Hope Bridge and the Sakonnet River Bridge.
Close all three during the same storm, and Newport, Middletown and Portsmouth lose every car route off the island.
Not one road stays open.
That happened during both the January 2022 blizzard and the February 2026 storm.
RITBA shut the Pell, Mount Hope and Sakonnet River bridges within hours of each other both times.
The Jamestown Verrazzano Bridge closes right along with them, which strands the island of Jamestown at the same time.
Psst! How much do you know about Rhode Island’s storms and waterways? Take our quiz and see how many you can get right.
Quiz
Ocean State Storm IQ
Answer these questions on Rhode Island’s bridges, storms, and waterways. We bet you can’t get them all right. Prove us wrong?
Providence’s Fox Point Hurricane Barrier went up after two hurricanes flooded downtown. Which two storms convinced the state to build it?
The Storm-Ended Bridge
The old Stone Bridge once carried traffic across the Sakonnet River between Portsmouth and Tiverton, on close to the same crossing the current bridge uses today.
A powerful gale tore a 200-foot gap in the old span in September 1815, and a similar storm reopened the damage in 1868.
Crews kept patching it.
The 1938 hurricane and 1954's Hurricane Carol wore down its approaches.
The last car crossed the Stone Bridge on May 6, 1957.
Rhode Island built a new crossing nearby instead.
What's left of the old span now serves as a breakwater and a fishing pier, not a road anyone drives at all.
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