Half-way there

Sean Hubbard - NewsPress

Sat, May 17 2008

— If the engineer wasn’t out of town, the bridge mover was. If the bridge mover wasn’t out of town, the weather was bad. If the weather wasn’t bad, too many county employees were on sick leave.
There were many obstacles that Bill Deering, district 1 Payne County commissioner, had to overcome to get started on moving his bridge that had been sitting beside Sangre Road just south of state Highway 51. The bridge that had been waiting to move to its new home over Council Creek on Council Creek Road for nearly a year finally got its wish on Tuesday.
Well, at least part. The top half of the bridge was cut off, loaded onto a truck and moved to its new location, while the bottom half will have to wait a couple more days.
“That was about the way we figured,” Deering said of completing half the job. “Nobody’s ever done this before.”
Tuesday morning, there was a crew of 10 district 1 employees, crane operators and bridge movers on site. The county employees were to make the final eight cuts before the cranes could load the bridge to be moved.
“These last cuts have me a little worried,” Deering said before the process began at 9 a.m. Tuesday.
However, almost everything went smoothly. There was just one slight snag: after the cuts were made, the top wasn’t detaching easily, Deering said. That problem was quickly fixed as one of the final cuts simply had not gone all the way through.
“We’re very relieved that we got that top part off without any more trouble than we had,” Deering said. “Getting that top off without tearing it up was a critical part. I was very pleased that it worked out as well as it did.”
The top portion of the bridge was estimated to weigh 40,000 pounds, but that was a little off. Deering said one of the cranes was holding about 36,000 pounds while the other was lifting the remaining 33,000.
“Those cranes had all they could take,” he said.
Once the top came off, and was carried to the truck, it was loaded and sent south down Sangre Road, when the process hit its second speed bump of the day. Deering said he wasn’t sure what the problem was, but he guessed an electrical line had to be moved at 19th and Sangre roads.
The top portion eventually made it through the intersection and continued on the approximate 14-mile journey to Council Creek. Deering said he expects the bottom portion to be moved this week, and the rebuilding process will begin.
The new bridge will be driven over the current bridge at Council Creek (after some more supports are added) and put back to together. The old bridge will then be demolished and the new bridge will sit in its place. Finally, a new deck will have to be poured, and then it will be back in use.
“I hope that we will be driving across that bridge within three months,” Deering said. “That may be overly optimistic.”

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