{"id":4873,"date":"2016-07-06T14:11:49","date_gmt":"2016-07-06T14:11:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/?p=4873"},"modified":"2016-07-06T14:11:49","modified_gmt":"2016-07-06T14:11:49","slug":"nipigon-river-bridge-failure-reports-wont-be-released-until-the-fall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/nipigon-river-bridge-failure-reports-wont-be-released-until-the-fall\/","title":{"rendered":"Nipigon River Bridge failure reports won’t be released until the fall"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two reports on a bridge failure in northern Ontario that severed the critical Trans-Canada Highway link between Eastern and Western Canada are in provincial government hands, but won\u2019t be made public until the fall, Canadian Press has reported.<\/strong><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

The steel decking on the newly constructed Nipigon River Bridge lifted about 60 centimetres on Jan. 10, forcing a 24-hour closure of the bridge, which is crossed daily by about 1,300 trucks, carrying an estimated $100 million worth of goods.<\/p>\n

Two independent facilities did testing on the bolts and have now submitted their reports to the Ministry of Transportation, but the government isn\u2019t making those public yet.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe study into the bolts is only one piece of the larger picture,\u201d ministry spokesman Bob Nichols said in a statement. \u201cThe bolt study provided us with only a partial answer about the bridge, and as such we think it\u2019s premature to discuss it on its own at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Government bridge engineers are conducting their own analysis and so is an independent engineering consultant with expertise in cable-stayed bridges. Those findings will then be compared and only then will the findings \u2013 including the already-complete bolt analyses \u2013 be made public, Nichols said. That\u2019s expected to be in the fall.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis type of work takes time, and it has been made clear to those involved that they should take the time they need to get it right,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

According to the report, NDP transportation critic Wayne Gates called on the Liberal government to release the reports on the bolts.<\/p>\n

\u201cDragging this out will only make it harder to complete repairs before next winter,\u201d he said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople deserve to know what is in those reports, and what\u2019s being done to fix the problems so this doesn\u2019t happen again, and won\u2019t happen elsewhere. Ontarians shouldn\u2019t have to wait until next fall to learn why the Nipigon Bridge failed.\u201d<\/p>\n

The temporary repair done on the bridge in January is functioning as expected, Nichols said.<\/p>\n

The $106-million Nipigon River Bridge project, the first cable-stayed bridge built in Ontario, opened the first two lanes about two months before the failure. Transportation Minister Steven Del Duca has said it\u2019s capable of withstanding winds in excess of 100 kilometres per hour and temperatures below minus 40 degrees Celsius.<\/p>\n

Work on the four-lane bridge project continues, with construction of the third tower \u201cwell underway,\u201d Nichols said. The government has said the bridge\u2019s problems were not related to tower design.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two reports on a bridge failure in northern Ontario that severed the critical Trans-Canada Highway link between Eastern and Western Canada are in provincial government hands, but won\u2019t be made public until the fall, Canadian Press has reported. The steel decking on the newly constructed Nipigon River Bridge lifted about 60 centimetres on Jan. 10, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4874,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[52],"class_list":{"0":"post-4873","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-provincial-news","8":"tag-current"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4873"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4873"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4873\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4875,"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4873\/revisions\/4875"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ontarioconstructionreport.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}