Popular connector route to remain closed at least until autumn

HAMBURG-The Wheatsworth Road bridge at the Gingerbread Castle won't be reopening anytime soon, according to Sussex County Engineer Eric Grove. The 1965, one-lane steel girder bridge that carries Gingerbread Castle Road over the Walkill in Hamburg was closed on May 20, when county engineers judged the bridge unsafe. The bridge closure has severed the connection between Route 94 in Hardyston and Route 23 in Hamburg. The road, which begins as Gingerbread Castle Road in Hamburg and becomes Wheatsworth Road in Hardyston, is the site of Hardyston's new municipal center-police complex, Hardyston Middle School, and the nearby recreation complex and middle school. Anthony De Vita, son of Joseph De Vita, general contractor for the municipal center, says that the bridge closure hasn't affected the construction schedule. "Our heavy equipment exceeded the weight restrictions for the bridge when it was open, and it is more convenient for us to get to the site via 94," De Vita said. "The new municipal center is scheduled to open in early October," said Hardyston Township Manager Marianne Smith. "We certainly hope the new bridge will be in place as soon as possible." Grove is looking at a late fall date for the reopening of a new two-lane bridge at the earliest, and an early spring date at the latest. Months before they closed the bridge, county engineers thought it was starting to get decrepit, and put funds to replace it in the 2005 county budget. The county expects the new bridge to cost between $500,000 and $600,000. The bid award will take place in late October to early November, if all goes as planned. "When the county shut down the bridge, it already had assigned Maser Consulting to perform the design work, and we had completed the field survey, the subsurface investigation and the preliminary design," said Maser senior engineer Nabil M. Ghanem. "After the county reported the serious condition the bridge was in, we put the design work on a fast-track schedule," Ghanem added. "We intend to replace the bridge with a two-lane, prefabricated galvanized steel structure with a precast concrete deck. We also will heighten and cap the abutments on all four corners to make the bridge rise higher above the Walkill, as the Department of Environmental Protection has required." "The prefabrication will minimize construction time," said Eric Grove, "We've applied for a general permit from the NJDEP to do the construction and our application is under review right now." The county also will reposition the retaining walls to accommodate a widening of Gingerbread Castle Road planned for some time in the future. Ghanem noted that Maser also has contacted the N.J. Historic Preservation Office to discuss any effect the construction might have on the old Wheatsworth Mill and the Gingerbread Castle, an attraction that opened in 1930. He said he expects his company to complete the final design and bid specifications by September. Before the county can destroy the old bridge, Grove explained, water and sewer lines that will run between The Bluffs at Ballyowen and Hamburg must be intalled beneath the bed of the Walkill River Now, the old bridge carries the water pipes over the river to Hamburg. Grove said the developer has assured him the work to install these underground utilities will begin soon. The Bluffs, Diversified Community's 67-home, age-restricted development, is under construction on Gingerbread Castle Road, a few hundred yards from the bridge.