WOLCOTT – The School Street Bridge in Wolcott has been removed just two years shy of its 100th birthday.
photo by Tommy Gardner
Earlier this month, a crew with CCS Constructors used cranes and heavy equipment to haul away the steel truss bridge that connected Route 15 to School Street over the Lamoille River, setting in full swing a seven-month construction project that is rerouting traffic to the gravel surfaced, now mud slickened, Flat Iron Road.
Built in 1928 and rehabilitated in the early 2000s, the bridge was decommissioned in 2018 after a routine inspection revealed several deficiencies and safety concerns. Drivers have since been crossing the Lamoille River on a temporary, one-way bridge laid over the original structure.
The route over the bridge to and from Route 15 is a popular one, with dozens of homes, the town offices, library and popular trailheads on the other side of the river from the highway.
Wolcott select board chair Linda Martin said her constituency has been patient over the eight years it’s taken for the Vermont Agency of Transportation to advance a full replacement project. The wait for the project to begin is over, and the final phase of waiting for it to be finished has just begun.
According to Agency of Transportation representatives, the bridge will be closed, and traffic rerouted to Flat Iron Road until Sept. 25. The representatives said the project could wrap up a month earlier, which would allow CCS Constructors to benefit from a payment incentive.
The bridge replacement will cost approximately $7.5 million, a price tag that Martin noted has increased by about $2 million over the last eight years. Agency of Transportation representatives said that’s due to rising construction costs as well as unforeseen costs related to installing new abutments for the bridge.
Wolcott is not responsible for contributing to construction costs, although the town has already paid about $46,000 toward designing the new bridge.
CCS has been active onsite since last fall, prepping the site for the new bridge by installing new abutments, or foundations upon which the bridge will rest, on the banks of the Lamoille River.
New abutments are necessary not only because the original ones are nearly a century old, but also because the new bridge will connect School Street to Route 15 at more of a square angle.
Agency of Transportation representatives said the state prefers square intersections with highways and the recently demolished bridge was angled to the west, creating a bit of a blind spot for traffic to the east. The new abutment on the highway side of the bridge is positioned several yards downstream toward Hardwick.
The new bridge will mimic the steel trusses of the old bridge, but it will be wider than the original structure and certainly much wider than the temporary one-way bridge that’s been in place for the last eight years.
According to Agency of Transportation representatives, the new bridge will feature two nine-foot-wide traffic lanes, as well as a three-foot shoulder to the east and five-foot shoulder to the west, which could accommodate pedestrian travel.
As trailheads on School Street and East Elmore Road, including one for the Lamoille County Rail Trail and newly established Wolcott Town Forest, become more popular, local trail advocates have discussed the importance of a pedestrian connector to shops and businesses on Route 15 in Wolcott.
Once installation of the new bridge begins, a separate construction crew with Stone Environmental will simultaneously install a cross-river connection for Wolcott’s burgeoning sewer system. That aspect of the project is set to wrap up by August 12, according to Agency of Transportation representatives.
While not ideal, Martin said the townspeople are adapting to the Flat Iron Road detour, which has been active since the fall but will receive even more traffic now that the old School Street bridge is fully decommissioned.
The select board chair added that Wolcott’s road crew of three workers has been spending most of its time maintaining the gravel road during the detour. They’ve been throwing stone and new gravel and even busted out a grader in an attempt to keep the road smooth.
This article and photo first appeared in the News & Citizen and is used with permission.
