New $40-m Bailey bridge opens at Worthy Park
A new 42-metre (140 feet) single-lane Bailey bridge, constructed at a cost of $40 million, was opened recently in Worthy Park, St Catherine.
The project included river training works and the placing of an inner guard rail, which acts as a protectant and a guide across the bridge.
Chief executive officer of the National Works Agency (NWA) Milton Hodlin said the river training activities, which stretched about 600 metres upstream, involved using material from the riverbed, which was reinforced with galvanised coated steel wires and gabion baskets.
“This technique allows it to last for up to 50 years. We’ve had some that were built in the 1950s and they are still intact,” he said.
Minister of Housing, Transport, Water and Works, Robert Pickersgill said the provision of a new bridge at Worthy Park would make it easier for residents to travel to various destinations “and the spin-off is that it makes commercial transactions more stable”.
The minister said that an effective monitoring mechanism would be put in place to prevent overloaded trucks from using the bridge. Scales, he said, have been purchased and “those truckers who flout the law will feel the sanctions in their pockets”.
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