The last expansion joint was filled with concrete on Friday 28 November and this needs a week to cure before traffic can be allowed on the bridge. The pedestrian sidewalks will be completed early in the new year.
Since 7 April residents from Blanco travelling to the airport and Geelhoutboom residents driving to George have been inconvenienced by the R93,9-million provincial government upgrade of the R404 airport/blanco road to Herold's Bay. The 19,2km contract for the rehabilitation and resealing of the road is scheduled for completion by May 2015. For the last eight months residents used a 15km detour via York Street while others negotiated the narrow farm road that crosses the Modder River lower down. The road was closed to all traffic with a stop/go control that utilised a single lane for the traffic on the western side of the bridge.
A traffic circle has been built in front of the pink Palmiet Winkel at the sand road turn-off to Gwayung. This will serve as the turn-around point for the George Integrated Pu-blic Transport Network (GIPTN) scheduled to commence operations next week.
Quintin Smith, a partner at SNA Civil and Structural Engineers and the consulting engineer for the project, said, "I want to thank the residents of George for their patience and cooperation. The construction went according to plan. It was a challenge to anchor the pylons on bedrock to ensure a solid foundation for the bridge as we had to work through 16m of decaying peat and mud as the area is very marshy. The length of the bridge was extended by an extra set of pylons that made certain that the bridge ends on solid ground."
Smith said that depending on the weather they do not expect to overrun the May 2015 completion date.
A worker surveys the bridge from below. Photo: Myron Rabinowitz
ARTICLE: MYRON RABINOWITZ, GEORGE HERALD JOURNALIST
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