The Fourth Street Bridge Is Gone. Dinner Plans Don't Have to Be.

Covington and Newport have always worked like one restaurant district.

Dinner on one side, drinks on the other. Pre-game at Smoke Justis, then the walk across the John A. Roebling Suspension Bridge to Great American Ball Park. Dinner at Pompilio's, then drinks back across in Covington. A stop at The Gruff before a Reds game. Late-night fish and chips at Molly Malone's after.

It all worked because the Fourth Street Bridge quietly stitched the two sides of the Licking River together.

Now that bridge is gone.

With the demolition and rebuild expected to stretch roughly 30 months, the easy shortcut disappeared. And suddenly people hear "bridge closure" and act like crossing the Licking River requires expedition gear.

It doesn't.

It's a detour, not a border crossing. The mountain is the same. You're just taking a different trail down.

There are still easy ways to move between both sides. The Girl Scout Bridge keeps you entirely in Kentucky. The Taylor Southgate and Roebling route takes you through downtown Cincinnati and right back into Covington. Depending on traffic, both work just fine. The City of Covington launched "Bridging the Gap" to keep people moving to local businesses, because the city already understands what the rest of us should too: this is manageable.

The restaurants didn't move.

Purple Poulet is still one of the most interesting dinners in Northern Kentucky. Blinkers Tavern still does one of the best steaks in the region. Smoke Justis still smells like bourbon and smoked meat the second you open the door. Pompilio's is still serving the kind of old-school red-sauce Italian people have been defending for decades.

Three of those restaurants — Pompilio's, Blinkers Tavern, and Purple Poulet — carry a Worth the Drive rating on wellfd. That means they're worth an hour in the car. The detour is seven minutes.

Great American Ball Park still sits right where it always did, between the Taylor Southgate Bridge and the Roebling. Thousands of people still make that walk every game. The night still works.

The only thing that actually changed is one turn at the end of your route.

Don't overthink it. Pick a bridge. Make the reservation. Keep doing what you were doing before.

Go to Newport anyway. Go to Covington anyway.

The Fourth Street Bridge is gone. Dinner plans don't have to be.