By Donald Wittkowski
Cape May County officials said Thursday they will have to completely close the Townsends Inlet Bridge for an eight-month overhaul because it would be impossible to allow traffic to cross it during construction.
The bridge linking Sea Isle City with Avalon along the scenic Ocean Drive will shut down beginning Sept. 17 and remain closed until May 22, 2019, for an $8.6 million reconstruction project to replace seven of its deteriorated spans.
The Cape May County Bridge Commission announced the closing in July, but Sea Isle Mayor Leonard Desiderio questioned this week whether one lane of traffic could remain open during construction to reduce the travel disruptions for local motorists.
“I know it’s going to be a real pain in the neck for us in Sea Isle,” Desiderio said.
The bridge commission said the demolition of the old spans will remove a major part of the structure, preventing traffic from crossing over it.
“The answer is no, for the simple fact that there will be no physical bridge,” Lewis Donofrio, the commission’s engineer, said in response to Desiderio’s question whether one lane could be kept open.
When the bridge is closed, motorists will be forced to make circuitous trips on Route 9 or the Garden State Parkway to travel between Sea Isle and Avalon instead of having a quick, direct hop over the Townsends Inlet Bridge.
During the bridge commission’s monthly board meeting Thursday, Donofrio said the contractor is planning an “aggressive” construction schedule that includes double shifts and working on Saturdays to finish the project by the arrival of Memorial Day weekend in 2019.
Construction is planned during the slower fall, winter and spring months to avoid travel headaches during the Jersey Shore’s bustling summer tourism season beginning Memorial Day weekend.
“It’s the whole reason the project is being done outside the summer tourism season,” Cape May County Engineer Dale Foster said.
The new spans are intended to wring more use out of a nearly 80-year-old bridge that has had a string of closings in recent years for structural, maintenance or road-related work. In 2017, it was shut down from April to late June for emergency repairs after structural cracks and deterioration were discovered during an underwater inspection.
The reconstruction project initially consists of demolishing the south abutment and the first seven spans on the Avalon side of the bridge. Approximately 245 feet of the 1,373-foot long bridge is slated to be replaced. Altogether, the bridge has 27 spans.
During construction, Ocean Drive in Avalon will be closed from the southern end of the seawall near Fourth Avenue to the Townsends Inlet Bridge. That part of Ocean Drive will be used as a staging and storage area for equipment and materials for the project.
Most of the demolition and construction activity will be performed using floating equipment on Townsends Inlet. However, the construction will occur outside the navigational channel and will not interfere with marine traffic, the county said in a press release.
In the meantime, discussions continue on long-range plans to replace the entire bridge, which was built in 1939 during former President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration.
“It’s your basic, vanilla bridge,” Foster said. “It’s not going to win any awards.”
Currently, there is no money available to pay the estimated $105 million to $175 million cost for a new bridge. Sea Isle and county officials have estimated it would take between three and 10 years for the planning, permitting and construction of a new bridge once the funding is found.
The new spans that will be installed starting in September will survive, even if the bridge is eventually replaced. Foster said the spans would be converted into a public fishing pier that would be adjacent to the new bridge.
One of the benefits of the new project will be a wider – and safer – sidewalk for people who fish off the bridge on the Avalon side, Foster explained. The sidewalk is just two feet wide now, but will expand to six feet wide once the new spans are in place.
In another improvement, the Cape May County Bridge Commission completed the installation of the E-ZPass toll system on the Townsends Inlet Bridge and its four other Ocean Drive bridges this past spring to give motorists the option of paying their fares electronically instead of having to fumble for cash or coins.
Starting in mid-September, the commission will impose a $25 “administrative fee” for E-ZPass violations if motorists don’t pay the toll.
Motorists still have the option of paying their tolls with cash or tickets. The commission stopped selling discount tickets on Aug. 1, but there is no expiration date for using them on the five Ocean Drive bridges.
Tickets cost $1.20, compared to the regular toll of $1.50, making them popular with local commuters.
