Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer stands behind the gates Thursday holding back a large group of pedestrians, bicyclists and pets that will hike up the spiral walkway and onto the Big Four Bridge.

"Count it down," someone yells, anticipating the gates being lifted.

Instead, a sound of a railroad locomotive plays over the speakers, kicking off the bridge's soft-opening, representing the days when the bridge was used for trains.

Groups supporting  a bill creating medical panels to review allegations of nursing home abuse are taking their cause to the airwaves.

The Kentucky Association of Health Care Facilities this week released a 60 second television radio ad, urging people to support Senate Bill 9.

The group is made up of nursing homes who want the review panels—which is called for in Senate Bill 9— as a safeguard against what they call overreaching trial lawyers.

The ad takes aim directly at the lawyers.

The Big Four Bridge opened Thursday morning and a big crowd showed up. WFPL will have a story later.  Until then, here are photos:

FRANKFORT — Advocates for Kentucky children on Thursday called for state leaders to provide funds and stave off recently announced cuts to programs that provide assistance for child care costs and to family members who take in young relatives.

The calls were made Thursday at the ninth annual Children Advocacy Day rally, which organizers estimated more than 1,000 people joined. Because of the crowd's size, the rally was moved from the Capitol Rotunda to outside.

Lower-calorie foods are driving growth and profits for chain restaurants, according to fresh research, suggesting that people are making smarter choices when it comes to burgers and fries.

We're still ordering the burger and fries, mind you. But we're going for smaller portions and shunning sugary drinks. French fry sales dropped about 2 percent from 2006 to 2011, while sales of lower-calorie beverages rose 10 percent, the study found.

Hoping to reduce gun violence in Kentucky, a group of Democratic lawmakers have filed a bill  that would allow Kentucky State Police to set regulations banning certain firearms or high-capacity magazines.

The bill, which state Sen. Kathy Stein plans to file in the Senate on Thursday, would also allow cities and colleges to regulate guns and would require private background checks  for every gun sale in Kentucky.

SULPHUR, Ind. —Authorities have released the names of three of the five people killed in an overnight mobile home fire in southern Indiana.

Crawford County Sheriff Tim Wilkerson says 32-year-old John Denton died in Thursday's fire along with his 8-year-old daughter, Kara Denton, and his 35-year-old half brother, Bill Turben.

John Denton's girlfriend and her 3-year-old son also died, but police have not released their names.

What do the Kansas City Royals, C. Everett Koop, Jack Nicholson and the United Methodist Church all have in common?

Turns out the Major League Baseball team, the former surgeon general, the actor and the denomination's general board and church society are all enemies of firearms, and as such have made it onto the National Rifle Association's list of "National Organizations With Anti-Gun Policies."

There were 366,000 first-time clams for unemployment insurance last week, down just 5,000 from the week before, the Employment and Training Administration reports.

Of note: that number from the previous week — 371,000 — is an upward revision. A week ago, the agency estimated there had been 368,000 claims over that period.