Equipment problems put contractor up a creek at Seal Cove bridge
By Craig Westcott
Ward 4 councillor Melissa Hardy confirmed last week what everybody who lives near Seal Cove bridge knew already, that work to replace the aging structure is delayed and will take until the end of this year before it’s finished.
Hardy said last week the contractor is facing challenges with the rock below the surface around the bridge and has been having trouble finding equipment for the job.
The project is shutting down for about a month.
“While the outcome remains favourable, there is going to be a delay in opening the bridge,” Hardy said. “The contractor has advised that new drilling equipment is being secured and is expected to arrive in mid-September. Once the equipment is on site, the drilling and piling work is expected to take three to four weeks to complete. Once the drilling and piling work is completed, all remaining work will be carried out, which is expected to take us from mid-September through to the end of the year.”
Hardy said Town staff are working diligently to ensure the contractor demobilizes the equipment that is left there now in order to make way for the new equipment.
“There is nothing the Town has done to cause this delay,” Hardy said. “And the Town is not going to be incurring any additional fees or costs as a result of this delay.”
All detours in the area around the bridge remain in effect, the councillor added, and will remain until the new bridge is commissioned.
“So, we’ll certainly have staff work with the appropriate authorities – the schools, emergency services – over the coming days to let them know of the extension of the delay,” Hardy said. “It’s certainly not what residents wanted to hear, but when it comes to the work that is being done and the piece of equipment that is required to complete the work that needs to be done, this is the only avenue we have at this point.”
Mayor Darrin Bent said he shares Hardy’s disappointment.
“We were hoping this project would be wrapped up somewhere before the end of September, now we’re into late fall… sometime before December 21, I would hope,” he said. “It seems we depend on the assessments and the work and bidding and the contractors to make sure that they have the equipment they need onsite to do these things. It appears there was a misjudgment in this case. It’s unfortunate. But the unfortunate part is not the fact that they misjudged, but that the residents of Seal Cove are now being inconvenienced for a further six weeks at least while this bridge work is being done. However, the alternative is much worse, that you close a bridge and you don’t use it anymore because it needed to be replaced. So here we are, we’re replacing the bridge and we’re taking our lumps along with it. But at the end of the day, I feel confident in the contractor and the ability to do the work, it’s just that it will take a bit longer. When it’s done the residents will have a bridge that they can depend on for decades into the future ensuring their access. At least there’s that at the end of the day.”