SEVERAL components of the Demerara Harbour Bridge (DHB) is slated for repairs in 2022, as part of a $900 million allocation in the landmark “oil budget.”

This was confirmed on Sunday by engineer and General Manager of the Demerara Harbour Bridge Corporation, Wayne Watson. Tenders have already been published for the construction and installation of 204 anchor blocks; fabrication and installation of 200 deck plates; rehabilitation of 24 regular and four large pontoons; fabrication and delivery of 30 notched h-beams.

As efforts continue to build a massive replacement for the harbour bridge, millions of dollars are being spent to replace the existing structure. Already, more than $924.5 million has been spent over the past four years to repair the bridge; and this is outside of the annual maintenance budget, and usually as a result of damage caused by vehicular and marine activity.

In 2020, that sum stood at a whopping $263,163,644. In 2019, $104,157,912 was spent on repairs. Earlier in 2018, the cost of repairing the bridge was $367,231,456; in 2019, the cost of executing repairs was pegged at $190,034,756.

This means that within the last few years, the DHBC has spent exactly $924,587,768 on repairing damage done to the bridge. In cases where an errant party can be clearly detected, those persons are liable to fund the requisite repairs to the age-old structure.

According to statistics provided by the DHBC, in 2020, some 75 per cent of marine accidents have been compensated for, while 95 per cent of those responsible for vehicular accidents have financed the repairs.

Public Works Minister Juan Edghill had previously explained that apart from accidents, the bridge continues to be damaged by speeding marine vessels, as well as by speeding trucks applying brakes suddenly. In such cases, no particular person or agency could be pinpointed to provide compensation.

As such, these repairs are often funded by the DHBC, with the support of government subventions. It was only recently that significant damage was done to ‘Span Nine’ of the floating structure, forcing government to institute measures that monitor the number of trucks going onto the bridge at once.

“We have to get a new culture of truckers driving on the bridge,” the minister posited. With trucks traversing the bridge at intervals, there is usually a daily build-up of trucks at both ends of the bridge.

Minister Edghill had said that at one point the DHBC was even considering having police traffic ranks stationed with their ‘speed guns’ along the bridge itself. The Public Works Minister indicated too that the owners and captains of marine vessels were also being engaged in relation to speeding, as well.

“Because some of them [the vessels] are moving with such speed, and they are creating waves and current, they are causing misalignment to the bridge,” Edghill had explained.

Meanwhile, as authorities continue to grapple with the high cost of maintaining the existing Demerara Harbour Bridge, works are progressing on the construction of a new, state-of-the-art structure, which is likely to commence before the end of 2022.

As it is, the Government of Guyana is in talks with the company that will be constructing the Amaila Falls Hydropower Plant to also construct the new river crossing; that company is China Railway First Group, which is part of a consortium of companies, and the second lowest bidder for the bridge project

The new bridge has become far more essential, as the importation of vehicles continues to grow, and as traffic becomes more and more exhaustive. The new structure is also likely to open up a number of new roads that will further lend to the alleviation of traffic congestion.