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Article published Jun 25, 2009 Bridge project spans 10 years: $1.4 million Townsend structure to be finished by end of August
By Iva Butler of The Daily Times Staff
Eight months to build and 10 years to get started.
That's what Blount County Highway Superintendent Bill Dunlap said of the new $1.4 million Cameron Road bridge across Little River at Kinzel Springs in Townsend.
"We should be done and out of here by the end of August," said Larry Eskew, vice president of Simpson Bridge Co., of Cleveland.Dunlap said the federal highway appropriation for the bridge was received in 1999, and it took until December 2008 to get it under contract. Work started Jan. 29.
Elected officials assisted in getting money earmarked for the new bridge. U.S. Rep. John J. Duncan Jr. helped the county get $1 million, and then-Sens. Bill Frist and Fred Thompson got another $600,000 for the project, Dunlap said.
Blount County was required to pay 20 percent of the cost.
Part of the delay was in deciding placement of the bridge, which replaces the current one-lane, concrete structure known as Wilson Bridge. The Tennessee Department of Transportation, funding authority for the project, first considered locating the bridge upstream from the existing structure.
A problem with that location turned up when the TDOT environmental impact survey found pyrite in a rocky bluff on Cameron Road. TDOT engineers didn't want to disturb the bluff and cause the mineral to enter the river because it would be harmful to aquatic life. Pyrite changes the acidity of the water.
In August 2003, Dunlap was quoted as saying, "It's going to leave me with the bluff area to contend with."Road must be widened
On Wednesday Dunlap said Cameron Road must be widened in that area.
"I'll put up some kind of blanket or mat to keep the pyrite out of the river while we break the rock with a track hoe," Dunlap said.
"I dread it, but we'll get it done."
TDOT had looked at locating the bridge downstream after rejecting the first site, but Don Sundquist, who was governor then and is a current resident of Laurel Valley in Townsend, scrapped that idea near the end of his tenure in office. Engineers were instructed to look upstream again.
The final location is 500 feet upstream from Wilson Bridge and is 250 feet east, but in sight of, the pyrite bluff. The new bridge aligns where Old Tuckaleechee Pike and East Lamar Alexander Parkway intersect.
"The bridge will be a standard two-lane structure similar to what's down river at Melrose (bridge over Little River at Walland)," Dunlap said.
Part of Cameron Road will be reworked with a stop sign located on the Old Walland Highway side. Drivers on the other section of Cameron Road will drive directly on and off the bridge, Eskew said.
The bridge contains 16 beams, four per span, that weigh 28 tons each.
The current bridge, which was built around 1910, will be converted into a covered bridge for pedestrians.
"The plan is for it to be the beginning of the walking trail in Townsend," Dunlap said.
An enhancement grant totaling $160,000 was approved in 1996 by Sundquist and then TDOT Commissioner Bruce Saltzman. The Blount County Commission approved an additional $40,000 for the project. The narrow old bridge is about 180 feet long.
Any money earmarked for the Cameron Road bridge that is not used for the new construction will be used by Blount County on another bridge project, possibly at Stables Drive near the Great Smoky Mountains Park line in Townsend, according to Dunlap.
He expects the bid on the planned bridge over Little River at Stables Drive to be let sometime this year by TDOT.