Farmers push bridge project

BROWNSTOWN — A group of Vallonia-area farmers renewed their efforts Tuesday to move county commissioners forward on a project to replace the Cavanaugh Bridge.

“We need a bridge, and we’re trying to energize you guys to get something going with it,” Tom Hackman told commissioners during their meeting at the courthouse annex.

The bridge, which carries County Road 550W in Driftwood Township over the Muscatatuck River into Washington County, has been closed since 2006. It was used by farmers with fields in both Jackson and Washington counties and by other area residents.

Although in Indiana the county bordering the north side of a river bridge is responsible for maintaining it, Washington County has routinely helped Jackson County maintain its common bridges.

Hackman and his father, Charles Hackman, representing a group of about nine people, both said it is dangerous to cross the bridge that carries Indiana 135 over the river with farm equipment. That bridge lies east of the Cavanaugh Bridge. The next closest bridge that spans the river lies west of the Cavanaugh at Sparksville. That bridge was replaced a couple of years ago.

Charles Hackman said a petition with the signatures of 100 Jackson County residents and 85 Washington County residents asking for the bridge to be replaced was given to commissioners in April 2004. He said former county engineer Jason Fee later estimated replacing the bridge with local funds would have an estimated price tag of $800,000 while doing so with federal funding would push the cost to an estimated $2 million and lengthen the time it would take to replace the bridge.

Hackman said engineering funds were later approved for the work, but that was the last he heard of it.

Warren Martin, who became county highway superintendent in July, said that to his knowledge no engineering work had been completed.

Martin said the Indiana Department of Transportation also had opted to not fund the project earlier this year, but he planned to reapply for bridge funds early next year.

Martin added it would be better for the county to try to obtain federal funding for the work.

“Doing it with local funds isn’t going to speed up the process,” he said.

Mike Magner, a consultant with FPBH Inc., North Vernon, said the design and engineering process doesn’t slow the process, but obtaining approval from other state agencies, including the Department of Natural Resources, can be slow.

Magner said in the past it used to take 10 years to see a project from conception to completion, but INDOT has been trying to speed the process.

If federal funding is approved in 2010, a new bridge would still not be ready for three to three and a half years, Martin said.

In another bridge matter, Martin told commissioners a $257,600 contract with Strand Associates Inc., Columbus, for replacing the Rockford Bridge over the East Fork of the White River they recently approved, has also been OK’d by INDOT. He is awaiting final notification before proceeding with the work.

Once notice to proceed is issued by INDOT, Strand Associates can begin working on the design and engineering work as well as various studies, including environmental and archaeological, for the project, Martin said.

The project will be funded through federal grants with a 20 percent local match.