New Brunswick’s Cherryvale Covered Bridge is being dismantled piece by piece and removed from the water, months after it was swept away by floodwaters.
“We have a portable barge and a crane. We go over and extract a couple of parts and bring it over here and it’s offloaded with equipment and loaded on floats,” explains construction worker Gordon Mitton.
The 87-year old structure was swept down the Canaan River near Coles Island in April and it has remained there since, but now crews are working to remove it from the water.
Mitton says they are trying to salvage as much of the wood as possible.
“There’s a lot of lumber under the water that we don’t see,” he says. “At least 30 feet of it they’re going to try and resurrect but I think it will be a larger portion.”
Mitton says he has heard crews plan to build a replica out of the wood, but the New Brunswick Department of Transportation and Infrastructure isn’t confirming the project.
Area residents Mildred and Donald Patterson say they have been waiting for an answer on whether a replacement bridge might be built since it washed out in the spring.
“I went right after the member here one day but he didn’t have no answer about what we’re going to get, even down the road he didn’t have no real answers,” says Mildred.
She says she is glad to see the bridge being cleaned up and hopes the government will soon shift its focus to building a new one.
The Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal estimates the project will cost around $246,000. The cleanup is expected to wrap up by the end of next week.
With files from CTV Atlantic's Ashley Dunbar
