The St. Tammany Fishing Pier was built from sections of the original I-10 Twin Span Bridges, which opened on December 21, 1965. Tens of thousands of cars used these bridges to cross Lake Pontchartrain between Slidell and New Orleans until the morning of August 29, 2005, when Hurricane Katrina made its final landfall. A storm surge in excess of 16 feet, combined with that water's return to the Gulf of Mexico, destroyed the twin bridges, creating one of the storm's most iconic images. St. Tammany Parish Government, partnering with LA DOTD and the LA Dept. of Wildlife Fisheries, chose to create a fishing pier as a new public use for the remnants of the bridges and as a testament to the strength and resiliency of the citizens who call southeastern Louisiana home.