Basin Road will be closed to vehicle traffic beginning Saturday (Oct. 1).
Pedestrians will still be able to access the popular area until October 26th. After that, access will be limited to certain hours, according to Larry Gamez, of Silver Bow Construction.
“Pedestrian access will be available across the bridge only between 12 and 1 p.m., that’s lunch, and 5 p.m. to 7 a.m.” Gamez says. “The Perseverance Trail systems will be accessible from the end of Evergreen Avenue via Flume Trail.”
The work is to be completed by mid-April.
Basin Road is the primary access to Last Chance Basin, Juneau’s water supply.
State Transportation Project Engineer John Kajdan says the old wooden bridge needs substantial reconstruction. A number of the old timbers are rotting and will be replaced.
The repair includes replacing the deck, updating the guard rail and much of the support structure under the bridge.
He says the Silver Bow Construction crews will work “bent-by-bent.”
“A bent consists of the timber columns and then the cap beam that sits on top of the column and supports the stringers which run lengthwise along the bridge and support the deck panels,” Kajdan says. “So they’ll pull up the deck and replace any stringers that have deteriorated and also be able to access the vertical columns, the diagonal cross bracing, and the horizontal cap beam that sits on top of the columns.”
The project will cost about $1.256 million, to be paid for by federal funds.
While the original Basin Road Trestle was built in 1936 during the AJ mining days, it’s been rebuilt a number of times since.
For a map of how to access the Perseverance Trail system, click here.
(Photos by Casey Kelly/KTOO)
