There is no time frame as to when repair works will be completed on the Lami Bridge which poses a risk to motorists and pedestrians.
The Fiji Roads Authority says while engineers are repairing the visible damage to the beams, several options are being explored.
The last time this Tamavua-i-wai Bridge was inspected was back in 2012.
It was on their medium priority list.
Since then, road authorities did not revisit the bridge.
“OK we have a network of 12,000 bridges across Fiji of those 12,000 bridges initial inspection identify 100 bridges which are high priority so our first objective was to get to work on those 100 bridges and undertake repairs and replacements where necessary. Now those high priority ones are imminent danger of collapse so in most places we had to take immediate action some of those have had to be closed some of them have had to have weight restrictions imposed and some of them had to have emergency repairs,” said Rory Garland – Acting CEO, Fiji Roads Authority.
Only yesterday, it was brought to the Fiji Roads Authority’s attention that the beams on the bridge were damaged.
The extent of the damage on the beams is severe and detailed repair works are now underway.
There are three solutions as medium quick- fixes.
“Yeah we looked at this and we have a 3 stage plan and action..first is to fix the damage to the beam so that we can open the other lane to get traffic flowing again,” he mentioned.
For now, traffic is re-directed into a single lane for the Capital city’s frequented entrance.
The FRA’s immediate objective is to re-open the closed lane on the bridge.
“We discovered this crack on of the steel bridge yesterday afternoon and since then we have been working around the clock to develop a repair for this crack on the bridge,” he said.
The Fiji Roads Authority has started works on the bridge and will be working around the clock to repair the bridge however no time frame has been given when works will be completed.