PennDOT reveals river bridge design changes

By DAVID HULSE

SHOHOLA, PA — The new Barryville-Shohola bridge is not going to look like the one that Pennsylvania transportation officials promised and it may take a bit longer to complete.

Last March at a ceremony for the beginning of construction, PennDOT released a Gannett Fleming Inc. architectural drawing of a five-pier bridge with five upstream viewing balconies. The accompanying press release detailed only three balconies, but the drawing made a bigger impression, local officials say. However at an unannounced September 2 meeting, PennDOT informed local officials that the contractor, Fahs-Rolston Paving Corp, Binghamton NY, has scrapped the five-pier design in a cost-saving measure.

The new design was said to be unfinished and could require another five months before work can continue. Major work activity on the $9.4 million project ceased with recurrent high-water incidents in August. Workers had planned to complete their pier work in the river during warmer weather so that steel work could continue during the winter. Plans called for the completion of the new bridge in 2005, with 2006 devoted to the demolition of the old bridge.

Shohola Supervisors Chair George Fluhr said PennDOT officials reported that the new bridge would still be completed by 2006, but provided no status report on the construction. “I don’t think they knew,” Fluhr added.

The Gannett Fleming plans for the bridge resulted in part from public input at a series of PennDOT hearings on the project in recent years. While he admitted that the changes may have been necessary, Fluhr was unhappy that PennDOT had authorized the changes without any further public meeting or announcement. “I’ve had their drawing hanging on our meeting room wall for six months. It’s not right that they ignored local officials and our constituents. It’s just a matter of courtesy,” he said.

Town of Highland, NY, Supervisor Allan Schadt echoed Fluhr’s comments. “They’re building something down there that doesn’t look like what we’ve been told to expect. If people asked why, we’d be looking like idiots,” Schadt said.

PennDOT spokesman Dave Krisanda said Tuesday that despite any changes that have been made or will be made by the contractor, the overall look of the bridge will remain the same. The piers will be made with an architectural pattern that will look like Pennsylvania dry-stacked bluestone and the bridge will have balconies to overlook the river.

At Thursday’s meeting, the local officials also expressed an interest in obtaining an updated drawing of the new bridge. “We are working to obtain such a drawing and will provide a copy shortly to the local officials and also post it on our website,” he said.

Concerning delays in construction, Krisanda said the contractor is currently about two months behind in the planned schedule, but the completion date remains the same: the fall of 2006.

If the project is delayed further, it would not be the first time. A required archeological study unearthed a prehistoric Native American camping area on the Shohola shore, which set back construction two years.

The project replaces the 1941 bridge, which has suffered recurrent episodes of falling concrete from its aging deck.

With its shoulders, the new 812-foot bridge would provide almost twice the width for driving surfaces in addition to a wider sidewalk and the three observation balconies.