That’s what I was about to point out. In fact, for a while it was actually called “The bridge to nowhere” It was basically just a really really long on/off ramp for I94 from Bay View.
But it was still a great way to get from Bay View to Downtown. It takes, probably 3 or 4 minutes to cross. Doing the same thing on surface roads, without fighting traffic, is closer to 10 or 15 minutes. With traffic, it would be awful. There’s currently talks of taking it down. I have no idea what they plan to do with all that traffic. It would tear up the city roads and bridges in a year or so and kill the home values just as quickly.
Oh, and BTW, Hampshire, they did eventually extend it. I’m not sure how familiar you still are with the area, but it now continues all the way to the 128th air force base. It has exits at Oklahoma, Howard, Layton and Pennsylvania as well as the one in Bay View (in a slightly different location).