 For transportation on the bay , steamboats were commonplace between Corpus Christi and Ingleside during the 1930s . Native Americans used a route made up of a series of shallow <unk> beds , dubbed Reef Road . The passage , which was about 18 to 24 inches in depth , could be <unk> on foot or horseback during low tides to travel across the opening of Nueces Bay into Corpus Christi Bay . White settlers discovered the road in the 1860s , and it became a common way to pass from Portland to Corpus Christi via buggy , although its jagged course had to be marked with posts and horses would sometimes fall off the beds and drown . A wooden causeway connecting Portland and Corpus Christi was first constructed in 1915 , but was repeatedly rebuilt and destroyed by several storms . A permanent concrete bridge was erected in the 1950s , and a double lane was added in 1988 . The approximately mile long structure is today known as the Nueces Bay Causeway . 
