Vincent Thomas Bridge 16-month closure begins this weekend

Pedro is bracing for a major change in traffic. Oh boy, the Vincent Thomas Bridge is closing at midnight for the next 16 months. Gigi Gracia joins us live with more on the closure, what it means for traffic there. Good morning. That's right, the detour signs are already up and it is official at midnight tonight. The bridge will shut down until March of 2028 for much needed construction. It is structurally safe right now, but they wanna give it a sort of a glam up because it is 63 years old. Now joining me now live, two South Bay social media influencers, Brandemir Kovartic from From San Pedro Vibe in Alberto Castillo, South Bay. Bay Birdie, better known as Birdie, and they are organizing a community get-together, an old-fashioned let's cruise the bridge for one last ride. Brandomir, what is the idea behind this? You're inviting folks to come out at 9 o'clock tonight. This is not an official event, by the way. It's just let's come out and have a good time to cruise the bridge. We thought, because collectively, Bertie and I reached somewhere between three and five million views every month. We thought that we wanted to have a Ciclavia level community event without having to use all of the resources necessary to pull off a Ciclavia to celebrate the history and the pride that we have for this bridge. Now, both of you grew up in this area and the bridge has been a- Part of a lot of people's childhood, getting to and from, right, Bertie? Yep, correct. I'm born and raised here, and that bridge means everything to me. It's so iconic. I use it almost every day, so this closure is going to be a big hit to my heart. Now talk to me about the stories because I know you guys have gotten a lot of comments and this is sort of interesting because they're not direct competitors but social media is always a competition. But you guys brought your two social media sites together for this one last ride and people have been sharing their stories and the number one story and this probably would have been me as a little girl. People as children were scared of the bridge. Yeah, we're getting hundreds and hundreds of comments and a lot of them are very nostalgic comments. And one of my favorite comments was, somebody says, when I was a little girl, I'd have to duck down in the backseat because I was so scared of the heights of crossing the bridge. And so you guys enjoy yourself tonight, I won't be joining you. But if I did, I'd be ducking down in the backseat again. And that's my favorite part about what we're doing here is we're bringing. Bringing out all of that nostalgia and history of this bridge. And Bernie, you got the same kind of comments, but some of the adults are telling you it still gives them the what? The heebie-jeebies. It's a tall bridge. Yeah, and I'm one of those people too. I mean, I still get scared sometimes too, and it brings back that childhood memory. Okay, let's tell folks, what are you coordinating? Again, this isn't official, so you don't have to register. You don't have to sign up. You just have to show up. At what time? Nine o'clock? At nine o'clock. We really wanted to utilize the last couple of hours of this bridge being open for literally one last ride. And so, yes, this is not an official event. There's no starting point. It's just go ahead and cross the bridge. We expect a lot of people to show up, and we expect this to be. We expect not to have a destination, but the journey is the destination. And so if there's traffic, we're in it together, and we're in it to celebrate the last moments of this bridge before we lose it for over a year. And Bertie, a lot of folks have told you they're coming out. I think some people are going to come out. They're going to bring their classic cars. It's going to have that Van Nuys vibe from the 50s when people would just go out cruising on a Wednesday. Yeah, yeah. I had a lot of the classic cars, a lot of new cars. And I think everybody just wants that low, slow kind of cruise, get their little pictures in. But the biggest thing is we've got to follow the rules, too. We've got to follow the laws, the rules. Nothing changes. But, yeah, enjoy it, have fun, and, you know, get your last ride in. All right. South Bay Birdie at San Pedro Vibe, thank you very much. Coming up at 7, we're going to talk to them a little bit more. We're also going to talk to Caltrans about what you need to know about this bridge closure. Again, it closes at midnight tonight for this glamour for a lot of construction, and it won't reopen until 2028. So we'll have all the information you need to know about that coming up on Good Day LA. For now, I'm Gigi Gracia, live in San Pedro. I'll send it back to you. I feel like they're going to jam up that bridge. What time is that going to happen again? So just for people who are driving through the area, because a lot of people use the Vincent Toms Bridge, and they're going to have some fun there. It's a nice event, but it starts at 9? 9 p.m., and you're estimating 9 p.m. to 11 p.m., and you're really sort of hoping for a traffic jam so that you can really enjoy the bridge. We're hoping that a lot of people will get to participate. And if it's a slow go, the better pictures you're going to be able to take. Just don't take them while you're driving, right? Exactly. You've got to be safe, got to be careful, and just enjoy yourself. Save the moment. 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. Okay, okay.