A bridge in Coniston is in much worse shape than originally thought and will have to be completely replaced at a cost of $1.9 million.
That's substantially more than the $600,000 originally budgeted for work on the Coniston Creek Bridge on Government Road. A staff report headed to city council Tuesday said the increased costs are the result of several factors.
“The additional costs may be attributed to poor soil conditions requiring more complex foundations,” the report said.
“More extensive repairs (are) required for structural elements, which can include additional rehabilitation work, deck repairs, new bearings, repairs to girders, etc.”
There's also additional road work required adjacent to the bridge and additional improvements to storm sewer, water and sewer services.
In addition to the bridge in Coniston, two other area bridges are also in need of more costly repairs, leading to a shortfall in the repair budgets of about $2,425,000.
One bridge is the Black Lake Road Bridge in Lively, which had an original repair budget of $450,000. But the updated estimate is $950,000.
“After detailed investigation, additional rehabilitation work was identified, including repairs to deck, improvements to deck drainage, removal of expansion joints, new bearings required, repairs to girders,” the report said.
The third is the Finland Creek Bridge on Balsam Street in Copper Cliff, where cost estimates have soared from $575,000 to $1.2 million. The reasons for include the “the complexity of site issues, including stream bypass due to existing culvert, poor soil conditions, the fact the culvert is non standard size and “additional civil work including storm sewer outlet and watermain relocation.”
To make up the difference, staff is proposing reallocating funds saved for other bridge repairs, in particular the Kalmo Road Bridge in the Valley. Staff is proposing taking $1.3 million from that reserve and reallocating it to Coniston Creek, and another $350,000 for the Black Lake Road bridge. Repairs to Kalmo aren't scheduled to begin until 2017 or 2018, so the timeline won't be affected.
Another $400,000 is being taken from funds saved to repair the Garson Coniston Bridge for the Black Lake and Finland repair projects, as well as $375,000 from the Frappier Road Bridge fund for Finland Creek.
The higher-than-forecast repair costs were uncovered by a bridge inspection consultant the city hires every two years to give an updated assessment of the state of municipal bridges.
“These inspections are visual reviews of the bridges including asphalt condition, deck condition, barriers, abutments, embankments etc,” the report said. “The engineer may make recommendations for further review, propose improvements based on visual and estimate costs based on the visual review. The city budgets for and prioritizes the bridge program work based on these reports.”
