Main Street Bridge could open to traffic Oct. 12

Closed for nearly two months for deck replacement, the Main Street Bridge that connects Slatington and Walnutport could be open to traffic by the end of next week.

Pennsylvania Department of Transportation spokesman Sean Brown said Friday afternoon the bridge is “tentatively” scheduled to be open to traffic by Oct. 12.

“The contractor will have additional work to do, but that can be accomplished with the bridge open to traffic,” Brown said. “Schedules are subject to change.”

Pennsylvania Department of Transportation spokesman Ron Young said last month that the bridge was scheduled to be open on or before Oct. 20.

Once it opens, Young said there will be times when additional work will require lane restrictions, and updates will be provided when they occur.

After several delays, the Main Street Bridge, over the Lehigh River, finally closed in August.

Although the bridge is closed to vehicles, plans were made so that emergency medical services were still able to use it.

Walnutport borough Councilman David Stankovic previously said he believes school buses should have been allowed to travel over the Main Street Bridge while it was shut down for repairs.

Eighteen Northern Lehigh district vehicles, buses, minibuses and vans have had to use the detour through the Lehigh Gap, which added travel time to each of those runs in the morning and afternoon. Some buses added more than an hour of travel time, cumulatively, Superintendent Matthew Link said.

But Young said allowing school buses to go over the bridge while repairs are underway was determined to be unsafe.

The closure of the bridge was originally slated for Aug. 7, but that date was pushed back due to the contractor’s schedule.

Its deck has been rated as poor, and the bridge is being replaced with a 48.5-foot-wide, 419-foot-long deck. The deck is originally from 1969.

This section of Main Street has an average daily traffic volume of 10,015 vehicles.

The Main Street Bridge is one of four in the Lehigh Valley being repaired under a $2.5 million contract.

Work on the bridges include repairing steel, decks, beams, bearings, joints and scouring countermeasures for the bridges over waterways.

The general contractor to repair the bridges is H & K Group of Skippack, Montgomery County.

Traffic is being detoured on Route 873 (North Walnut Street), Route 145 (Riverview Drive/North Best Avenue), and Route 248 (POW/MIA Remembrance Highway).

Pedestrian access is being maintained on the bridge during the deck replacement.