Well, I've seen some of the vehicles that people use to get back and forth to work, and I'm scared to share the road with them, at times. I'm not surprised some vehicles can't drive that work road, they have a difficult time even on asphalt. And the drivers, whew, now that's another topic for discussion. Who are we kidding, they've taken drivers ed, and really have a license?

Gee I thougth this bridge would be finished for the election. Well maybe by next summer those 8000 vehicles will be back crossing the new bridge.

Cheers

From August 13th:

'Manager of General Operations for the City, Bob Radloff says the Cameron Street bridge will be open for traffic by the end of this year.

The contractor, IDL Projects has signed an agreement that the bridge will be completed no later than December 31st of 2008'.

Take your time! The approaches and the traffic circle won't be ready by then either!

Don't do a rush job that won't stand the test of time!

Please.

Moses, Realistically there was noway that the bridge could have been completed by Dec 31st. They are making a valiant effort.

As far as the completion date, who was more naive, the contractor who signed the completion date, or the owners believing that it could be done in 5 months.

Eitherway you cut it, it still is a 9 to 12 months project.

He Speaks: This is the same naive contractor that recently 'signed an agreement' to complete the River Road flood protection project by February 27th, for a maximum of $2 million.

Why? Because that's what the City told them to do.

Think that 'agreement' will be honoured?

Is this the same City that is trying to evaluate proposals for the RCMP building based on quality and cost control? Wonder if they evaluated this contractor based on construction schedule control?

The Cameron St., Bridge has been a fiasco from the very beginning. They should have just repaired the bridge and got on with the business of living, however it was not to be.

Three years and $15 Million dollars later we still have no bridge, and I suspect we wont get one until spring.

This bridge is a testament to Colin Kinsley and the present City Council.

1, Not really necessary
2, Little if any serious consideration given to the project.
3, Three years late.
4, Over budget, and the cost still rising
5, Will not serve any more traffic (probably less) than the old bridge.


No doubt all the back slappers, and hangers on around the local politicians will roll out the red carpet, cut the ribbon and name the bridge the Colin Kinsley Bridge.

If anything it should be called **Kinsleys Folly** however not much chance of that happening.

Moses, my opinion is that they got the River Road, because they put in the best proposal. Or was it the only proposal.

anyway, will they meet the Feb 27th deadline.... likely not.

What real difference will it make if it is delivered on Dec 30th or May 30th. Nothing worth worrying about in twenty years from now

Who should build the RCMP building, IDL or Dominion Fairmile. Who ever will give the best deal to the city. no protectionism. if Dominion Fairmile can build it faster and cheaper, than let them. If IDL can, great.

"Palopu"

you know what Palopu??? It is OK to shut up, so in not letting yourself look like a fool!!

The Cameron Street bridges was repaired, many times, every year, and you want to repair it once more!! This bridge has cost the tax payers millions of dollars every year, for years, to keep this wooden piece of CRAP open!!

You, Palopu, are a waste of tax payers money! The bridge is done, as we new it in days gone by!! Get over it!! Toast.......... got it!!

There is a joke about a bridge builder, and I would like to say it on here, but it isn't allowed!! But you Palopu, would be the brunt of the joke!! Try and put some thought, or common sense into your comments!!

Repair it????? What a stupid statement at this point!! Actually, it is a stupid statement, if you would have said it 20 years ago. Ernie Obst made the same stupid statement many years ago!! His stupid statement cost us $900,000, and a bridge that was not accessible, 6 months out of the year!! Cost us millions of dollars over the years!!

Palopu, get a grip!! Do you even live in Prince George????

taxinapothole

wow tax, tell us how you really feel ;-)

My question to Palopu is in regards to #5 on your list - how will this serve "probably less" traffic than the single lane did? Or did I miss something?

taxinapothole
you say -
"to keep this wooden piece of CRAP open!!"

This was a heritage bridge which would have drawn tourists had it been kept as a foot and cycle bridge.

It didn't cost millions of dollars to keep it open. The City received that bridge for $1.00 and it was never supposed to be a traffic bridge. Foothills Bridge was the traffic bridge.

I agree with Palopu, a terrible waste of taxpayers' money and not only that it is unsightly.

Alot of you people with negative comments know very little about anything.The Bridge is going as fast as it can for so many reasons people with your intelect would never comprehend. Maybe you should contact one of the contractors and get the other side of the story. Maybe then you wont sound so stupid.

taxinapothole, I see you have been sucked in by our crew at City hall. It was stated many times that the bridge could of been repaired for $750,000.00. And for all the traffic that used it that repair job would of been good enough for thne 3500 light vehicles and about 100 heavey trucks that use it every day. These are the figures that came out of a study done for the City by an engineering frim. And then you would hear our past Mayor and others tell us that up to 8000 vehicles a day used the bridge. Pure BS.

It was stupid to build the the bridge in the first place whhen less then a Km away is a new four lane bridge. The fact is the bridge should of been blown out of the river instead of spending $9,000,000.00 to replace it. That is if the City had the brains to have IDL sign a contract for a firm price instead of a completion date. I took bets on this site that it would be closer to $20,000,000.00 before they finish the job.

Cheers

You are so missinformed.I feel sorry for you. I don't know what else to say. IDL is a very reputable company with alot of skilled employees. I guarantee if anyone will do the job well it is them.

Taxapothole. Seems you are totally out of touch with reality.

#1. Counting the Cameron St Bridge, the John Hart Bridge, and the Foothills Bridge we have 3 bridges across the Nechako River, to serve approx 20,000 people who live on the Hart Highway, or North Nechako.

No. 2. The John Hart bridge was twinned a number of years ago to handle the **so called** additional traffic from the Hart Highway, and with the Foothills Bridge the Provincial Government decided that two bridges were sufficient to handle this traffic and intended to close the Cameron St. Bridge. The City in its wisdom purchased the bridge for $1.00 AND PART OF THE AGREEMENT WAS THAT THE CITY WOULD BE RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY AND ALL REPAIRS TO THE BRIDGE.

No. 3. Contrary to popular opinion the cost to keep this bridge repaired cost the City approx $75,000.00 to $100,000.00 per year. If you would care to take a few minutes and look at the Citys website you would see that 3 years ago they stated that this bridge could be repaired and resurfaced for a cost of $750,000.00 and that the repairs would be sufficient to keep it operating with normal maintenance for the forseeable future.

No. 5. The City has stated that the Cameron Street bridge handles approx 8000 vehicles per day . They further stated that once the new bridge is completed the traffic would increase to 14000 vehicles per day. WHAT THEY DIDNT STATE IS WHERE THE OTHER 6000 VEHICLES WOULD COME FROM.
The population of the City has not increased in the past 5 or 10 years. Truck traffic from the pulp mills and the Hart Highway that would normally use this bridge has decreased by approx 50%. Business on first Avenue and River road has decreased.

6. The Cameron St. Bridge with normal maintenance and one way traffic was more than sufficient to handle the traffic that was using the bridge. The decison to tear it down and build a new one was nothing more than a MAKE WORK PROGRAM, .

7. This new bridge will cost $15 Million before it is completed. For 15 million we could have done maintenance on the bridge of 175,000.00 per year for 85 years.

8. This bridge has rarely if ever been shut down for more than 6 weeks for maintenance, the longest shut down ever is the present one which is going on three years.

9. If we can get by without this bridge for three years what makes you think it is such an important project.

10. Three bridges across one river ( 8 lanes total) within 5 kilometres of each other for a City of this size to service 20,000 people is about as stupid as you can get.

You are so missinformed.I feel sorry for you.

I wonder who is missinformed? No one has ever questioned the reputation of IDL. I will be the first to say that I know nothing about them and they are not the topic at the moment. The topic is the mismanagement at City hall over the years. And that is about to change.

I'm on the same page as Palopu.

rayce2324, so dont say anymore you are in over your head would be my advice.

Cheers

Just wondering if the new bridge is going to be two lanes!

Good summary Pal and I am on your page. I said Foothills Bridge when it should have been the John Hart Bridge.

Three bridges within 5 km. of each other is ridiculous.

As one lady noted during the controversy in a letter to the Editor, "for heaven's sake, it is only 3 mins longer to town if you are using the John Hart Bridge instead of the badly named Cameron Street Bridge". This lady had moved here from a more congested City and could see exactly what was happening.

This was nothing more than the pressure of the people of the Hart Highway and the North Nechako.

It is not over, it will go down in history as the biggest travesty of the last City Council. You couldn't get elected unless you were for the bridge and so they all went along with it.

Submitting to pressure groups will be the legacy of Kinsley and the bridge will be seen as short-sighted policy.

Im beginning to wonder if some of you know why we replace old things? Old things wear out. The life expectancy of a new home is 25 years yet you want us to keep fixing a 60 somthing year old bridge. Do you drive your first car or have you upgraded to a new more efficent model?

I don't dissagree with the fact we have to many bridges so close together. I however have tried to go East while driving a large truck. Going down 5th ave which should be two lanes not 4. Turning down Carney then First.Try this trip once while traffic is busy and you will see how this new bridge will help. As far as IDL's rep. Read what people are writing before you say no one is questioning the companies abilities.

I am also on the same page as Palopu. The city traffic manager himself said that the Cameron Street Bridge could be repaired for less than 800 grand.

A properly built bridge does not have to be replaced every 60 years. There are bridges all over the world that are in daily use and some were built as long as five centuries ago!

I suspect that someone believed that the funding for an entirely new Cameron Street bridge could be easily extracted from the federal and provincial governments with perhaps another third coming from the pine beetle fund.

Then, at the end of the day someone could have posed smiling in front of the new bridge just in time for the municipal election (this last one) in a grand ribbon cutting ceremony.

It did not work out that way. Well, life goes on and we will indeed have a new bridge and a huge amount of money to pay off over many years.

As far as I am concerned the whole thing is water under the bridge by now.

I live on the Hart and I did NOT vote for the incumbent 3 years ago as I never believed the promise about the bridge.

Cheers!

The New Bridge will be two lanes, Steel Beams mounted on the old Cement Pilars.

The beauty of a wooden bridge designed the way the Cameron St., brige is designed is that you can make repairs to different sections of the bridge as needed, and do not have to replace the whole bridge.

Considering we are located in the middle of a forest, surrounded by sawmills, it would never be difficult to get the necessary timber to make repairs, unless you are like our buddies at City Hall and bring in Hardwood from South America at a huge cost, and then complain about the cost of maintenance.

rayce2324 "I however have tried to go East while driving a large truck. Going down 5th ave which should be two lanes not 4. Turning down Carney then First."

If you were going East what was your destination?

The answer to that would be very helpful. It is not a criticism.

Palopu has it right

I remember as far back as 2000 some community members in the know joking around that the only reason Kinsley wants the Bridge so bad is so that it can be the Kinsley bridge.

I have faith that the new council would axe the idea quickly. But it probably should have a name, maybe somthing more historical. Maybe something in Carrier or a local person who played a key role to the formation of Prince George in 1915. There are lots of possibilities. Name the parkade under the Casino the Kinsley Parkade, I'm Ok with that;-)

That actually was never called the Cameron Street Bridge, it was the old Nechako Bridge. It was called the Cameron Street bridge when the whole push by "the gang" decided to replace it. Cameron Street is merely a name on a map going just off Carney Street. Anything to fool the public.

Any chance that I can get an old timber or bolt fromthe bridge to put in my collection of things from prince george that hung on for way too long. It could go up on the wall with; the canopies from 3rd avenue, Colin Kinsley's political career, the coliseum, the moose's hop of being re-elected, the list could go on and on.

"The life expectancy of a new home is 25 years"

?????? Maybe the roof, the paint, and the carpet and vinyl flooring, but the entire house?