The communal chief, along with former Minister Lucio Cáceres, toured the La Barra bridge and explained the work being carried out to shore it up. He stated that it is a race against time, but “we are not magicians.”
The mayor of Maldonado, Enrique Antía, who toured the La Barra Bridge area this Friday with the former MTOP minister, Lucio Cáceres, explained that work is continuing to shore it up. He maintained that it is a race against time to avoid a fatality, but “we are not magicians”, he pointed out. For his part, the former minister indicated that there will be important developments in 15 days.
Antía highlighted the record time in which the Maldonado Municipality acted together with the Saceem company. For this, beams of 12 by 1.90 meters will be placed at the headwaters through a maneuver that seeks to prevent the bridge from continuing to descend and light traffic can be released for the season. In addition, he was pleased with the speed with which the issue has been addressed and in record time. On the other hand, he stated that the support beams were ordered to be made and will be delivered next week, as well as the concrete bases because “we are facing a race against time and work is carried out even at night.”
When asked about the existence of a Plan B, the community chief pointed out that “when there is a sick person in the CTI, they think about saving him and that is the attitude because they are not thinking about the wake.” He added that “we are not magicians and we work to arrive before the season”, making it clear that what happened was a fatality.
Antía remarked that “we had a pandemic, the mall caught fire and now this; you have to have patience and poise in emergency situations.” Regarding the cost of the work, she expressed that “the Administration has never backed down, it wants to save the bridge in the first stage.”
For his part, the former minister and current adviser to the IDM Lucio Cáceres pointed out that “they are trying to save the terminally ill and the bridge was about to fall, but now it is a matter of unloading the weight of the bridge on the pillars that will be installed.”
He added that “if that does not materialize, you cannot even talk, since it was not about putting people to work on the structure because a misfortune could have been regretted.”
Likewise, he pointed out that every day they informed him how much the bridge was lowering and when it lowered 15 centimeters he was surprised. He commented that with the accessory works “it will stop going down and with that it would be enabled for light traffic.”
Regarding the works, he explained that “four piles will be placed -two on each side- and some steel beams that will allow the weight of the bridge to be unloaded”, while “for another 15 days it will not be possible to know for sure if the work carried out will bear fruit”.
He confirmed that the bridge in the last few hours has dropped two more centimeters and remarked that “the repair does not cause damage to the environment because it is a transitory situation for which the Ministry of the Environment was informed.” “A new bridge is not being built, and once the circumstance is over, the cofferdams that are being placed today will be removed,” he said.
He stated that “if it has to be demolished in the future, we will have to think about whether to build a new one, which would not be curvilinear, or if the current one is left in service with other characteristics” and advanced that the fact that the bridge is undulating implies a challenge for the technicians.
He recalled that when bridge two was built, at a time when he was Minister of Transport and Public Works, there was a clamor for an alternative to be made due to the traffic jams in the place and personally he thought that a bridge had to be built elsewhere. . He affirmed that at that time a survey was carried out that indicated that 80% of the consulted population wanted it that way, in that place and with those characteristics.
Repair, reconstruction or demolition
To all this, in the next few hours the cranes will be received that will be the prelude to the arrival of the beams that will be placed. “If it is possible to shore it up and enable it to light traffic, then an evaluation stage will come in which it will be determined, with more time, if it deserves its repair, reconstruction or if the cost is so great that it should be demolished.”
In relation to the causes that could have led to this situation, Cáceres said that the saline environment is one of the factors, as well as the growth of vehicles that were not those of the original design, which is why the bridge suffered.
On the situation of bridge one, he reported that “some maintenance will also have to be carried out.”
