While a conventional bridge would have been far less expensive, this is the signature bridge of Minneapolis, so our government officials decided to build something that would be a landmark. This is actually the 4th bridge to stand in this location. The first two were also suspension bridges, but they only lasted a short period of time in the late 1800's. A steel bridge stood for 98 years before being removed to make way for the current bridge.
Both MN-DOT and NBI consider this to be a single bridge despite there being two distinct suspension spans side by side.
