Gov. Larry Hogan announced Friday the beginning of a $28 million study of a new Bay Bridge crossing. He called it the “critical next step” to creating a new crossing to ease summer time traffic jams on both sides of the Chesapeake Bay.

The study is a follow-up to a five-year, $5 million effort that explored 14 potential corridors for that crossing from the top of the bay to just north of the Virginia line. In April 2021, researchers settled on the existing, traffic clogged Route 50-301 corridor.

Hogan said the new study would search for solutions to traffic problems along the 22-mile corridor from the Severn River Bridge to the Route 50-301 split on the Eastern Shore and that it would be a collaborative effort.

“We're going to seek input from county and local governments and from environmental regulatory agencies,” he said. “And we will be actively engaging Marylanders and providing plenty of opportunities for public citizen input throughout the entire process.”

The results of the original study raised the ire of stakeholders on both sides of the bridge.

Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman complained when it was released that it “didn’t consider a lot of the things that are being done to reduce traffic on the bridge.”

Since then, however, attitudes appear to have softened. Pittman issued a statement Friday thanking Hogan for “not only moving forward with the Bay Crossing Phase 2 Study, but alsosupporting our request to include the westbound approach to the bridge, so that the crippling traffic in the heart of our county can be addressed in a comprehensive way.”

In addition, elected officials from 12 of Maryland’s 23 counties have signed on to a request for a new, eight-lane bridge.