Northboro Road bridge work continues on schedule

by susan on November 24, 2009

(Photo by John Woodsmall)

I asked Town Engineer John Woodsmall for an update on the Northboro Road bridge work. Here’s what he had to say:

The bridge work is proceeding on schedule. Last week, the wood timbers were delivered and installed. The end of the week they started tensioning the timbers together (pulling them tight against each other, using threaded rods). This is a multi-stage process, and they have to wait 28 days between the first tensioning round and the second. In the meantime, they will be continuing to work on the approaches, and installing guardrail and fences. As of last week, they were on track to have the bridge open before Christmas.

Woodsmall also sent along some photos of the work. Click any of the thumbnails to enlarge and view as a slideshow.

{ 3 comments }

1 Mark November 24, 2009 at 3:10 PM: Does anyone know if there is going to be a sidewalk over the bridge? Figure this is the only time ever possible to make adjustment and hadnt heard if they’d planned on doing so…
2 minimom November 24, 2009 at 10:43 PM: that would make way too much sense…..wouldn’t bet on it!!
3 susan December 3, 2009 at 9:49 PM: Mark – I checked with Town Engineer John Woodsmall, here’s what he said:

Unfortunately, no, a sidewalk is not being installed as part of the bridge work. There is no room to add another sidewalk out there without doing substantial enlargement of the abutments and approaches. That is expensive, and simply well outside of the scope of the emergency repairs/replacement that MassHighway is trying to do.