Cleanup for last of 35W wreckage begins today

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The last of the wreckage being stored near the site of the Interstate 35W bridge collapse will start getting cleaned up today.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation said workers will begin going through the wrecked steel left stored in a park just downstream from the interstate. It's been stored there since shortly after the bridge collapse in 2007.

It's one of several sites where pieces of the bridge have been kept while lawsuits wind through the court system. But the state says it has a deal to move the debris. That's after a $52-million settlement deal was reached last month between a California engineering firm and more than 130 victims of the disaster.

A MnDOT spokesman said work is expected to begin this morning, as the debris is cut into pieces small enough to be hauled away by trucks.

The state thinks it will take about a month to clear the area below the University of Minnesota's West Bank campus, known as Bohemian Flats.