Chatham-Kent is moving ahead with a $1.6 million project to restore a pedestrian bridge in Wallaceburg that has been closed for several months over safety concerns.
On Monday night, council unanimously voted in favour of a rehabilitation project to make The LO Stonehouse Memorial Walking Bridge operational again.
The 81-meter long bridge runs over the Sydenham River and is located between the Lord Selkirk Bridge and Murray Street Bridge. According to the staff report presented to council, the structure was originally built in 1910 and converted into a pedestrian bridge in 1983.
The bridge is made up of four non-continuous spans. In 2003, the south span was replaced, the main span and lift spans were repaired and repainted and a new winch tower and enclosure was installed. Rehabilitation to the north span was completed in 2014.
The bridge is inspected bi-annually and in October 2019 some deteriorated parts of the structure were identified, according to the report. Two months later, the municipality retrained Dillon Consulting to complete a detailed assessment of the bridge's condition. During a review of the structure in November 2021, Dillon Consulting recommended that the bridge be closed in the interest of public safety due to deteriorated structural components. The bridge has remained closed since.
The project will include removing and fully replacing the existing main and lift spans with similar structures, galvanizing and recoating the north and south spans, and replacing the existing pedestrian railings on the north and south spans.
"This recommendation is the most economical of the alternatives and results in an approximate lifecycle cost of $22,500 per year in 2022 dollars assuming a service life of 60 years... Chatham-Kent has submitted an application to the federal government for the Active Transportation Fund," the report read. "The Active Transportation Fund is a funding program that provides $400 million over five years to support a modal shift away from cars and towards active transportation. The fund invests in projects that build new and expanded networks of pathways, bike lanes, trails and pedestrian bridges. If Chatham-Kent is successful in this grant application, this grant could fund up to 60 per cent of the eligible costs."
In addition to the construction costs, the current structural steel components on the bridge require a re-coating every 10-15 years with an estimated cost of $250,000 per coating.
It is estimated that the project will be tendered in either late 2022 or early 2023 for construction in 2023.
