Eight months after a bridge was destroyed by fire along Highway 311 near New Bothwell, Manitoba Transportation and Infrastructure (MTI) says that construction is about to get underway.
The bridge, believed to have been taken out by runaway stubble fires last May 10, has been cordoned off ever since and traffic has been rerouted through New Bothwell.
MTI says that construction of the bridge will begin this February and should be open to traffic by December 2024. The final completion isn’t anticipated until the summer of 2025.
“The design for a new bridge at this location was expedited and is now complete,” says a provincial spokesperson for MTI. “The construction contract was publicly tendered and has been awarded. Graham Construction and Engineering is the successful bidder.”
The total project cost for the new bridge is estimated at approximately $16 million.
The original bridge was made of treated timber with a creosote coating to help prevent rot. It took firefighters the better part of two days last May to douse the fire as embers continued to smoulder in the many structural joints of the wooden girders.
It wasn’t until MTI staff arrived that the decision was made to completely dismantle the bridge so that oxygen could reach every cranny and rapidly complete the inevitable burn.
The Citizen questioned MTI as to whether different materials will be used in the bridge’s reconstruction.
“MTI took into consideration the traffic needs in the area in the design of the replacement structure,” the spokesperson said. “The modernized structure will be a three-span concrete girder bridge, which will have a higher capacity to accommodate heavier or overload vehicles.”
