Horry County may not have to pay the remaining $11.6 million needed to complete bridges across the Intracoastal Waterway at Fantasy Harbour and Main Street in North Myrtle Beach.

The S.C. Department of Transportation and the State Infrastructure Bank are considering how to come up with the needed funding, which could allow construction of the spans to begin within a couple years, the DOT said Tuesday during a presentation to County Council.

"They are working on finding that shortfall in a timely manner with no additional contributions from Horry County," said Rob Hamzy, director of the Road Improvement Development Effort project for the S.C. Department of Transportation.

The bridge projects have been part of the county's $1.1 billion RIDE for nearly a decade and have been slated to move ahead piecemeal because of a lack of funding.

It is unclear when the two state groups will come to a decision, Hamzy said.

Horry County is paying to build traffic ramps where the bridges are planned while the $75 million needed to fund the two projects is sought.

"The bottom line is we don't have enough funding to do them both," council Chairwoman Liz Gilland said. "We decided to do what we could on each of them."

The ramps must settle for 18 months, and by the end of that period the money needed for construction might be available through the state, Gilland said.

The county took an approach similar to the "Bridge to Nowhere."

That was a piece of Veterans Highway that sat for years without traffic ramps waiting for additional funding to become available, she said.

"What we decided to do was build the reverse of the Bridge to Nowhere" by building the ramps and waiting for funding of the span, Gilland said.

The county is paying off a $2.3 million matching grant for the Fantasy Harbour Bridge project, county Attorney John Weaver said.

Some of the money was raised through an admissions tax charged to attractions in the Fantasy Harbour area.