By Thia James

Province to pay for Diefenbaker Bridge’s underwater inspection

Oct 7, 2013 | 6:30 AM

The Province of Saskatchewan will pay for the inspection of the Diefenbaker Bridge’s underwater piers.

The City of Prince Albert applied for funding for the inspections under the provincial Urban Highway Connector Program for the 2013-14 fiscal year. The ministry of highways and infrastructure confirmed on Friday that it has committed the funding for the inspections.

Joel Cherry, spokesman for the ministry, said the inspections have to do with erosion caused by high water levels in the spring.

“We’re committing funding to it, but the city is going to be managing the inspection,” he said.

The city has not yet awarded the inspection contract, but the executive committee will forward a recommendation regarding a proposal from ISL Engineering and Land Services to perform the inspections.

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Awarding the contract to ISL would be a step away from the consulting firm that performed the last major inspection of the bridge, Stantec Consulting Ltd. Stantec did not inspect the underwater piers – those are the parts of the bridge rooted to the North Saskatchewan River’s floor – a couple of years ago when it inspected the bridge.

Then, during the budget deliberations earlier this year, the public works department recommended the inspections take place during 2013. The budget committee recommended the province cover the cost of the inspections, and in late March, public works applied for funding for the inspections under the Urban Connector Program.  Funding from this program is used to maintain important shipping routes that go through cities.

Scott Golding, the department’s manager of capital planning and strategic services authored the report that will be on the table at Monday’s executive committee meeting. He said it’s an underwater level analysis of the bridge, which to the department’s knowledge has never been done before.

“The past inspections have always been … stuff on the above ground structure. You can walk, see rotting surfaces, piers, girders, things like that. And we don’t have a sense of how things are as part of the foundation system under, under the water.”

The report recommends that ISL perform the underwater pier inspections, and that the diagnostic method used to evaluate the bridge’s foundation include a verification dive and underwater sonar scanning. The contract that Golding’s report outlined would have a price tag of $65,887.

According to Golding’s report, the ministry has approved a base budget of $60,000, for the work and an additional $20,000 will be made available if needed.

Upon approval, the underwater portion of the bridge would be inspected later this year.

“We’re entering into the ideal timing for this inspection right now, actually kind of with the onset of fall here, water levels in the river are lower. So that’s the best time. More of the piers are visible above the water and then under water … with the less water flow through the river the currents are less, and so there’s less danger for obstacles and hazards under the water.”

Upon approval, they’d mobilize staff and contractors within the next few weeks, and it would take about a week on site to conduct the inspections.

The method that the public works department is recommending – the sonar-based scan – is new technology.

“We’re quite excited about it actually,” Golding said. “And we’re seeing it as a more efficient process where basically we’ve got new instruments and measurements that will give us a good image of what’s happening under the water line, and then any area that is not clear or there is more cause for concern is where we can specifically target with divers to take a closer look at.”

tjames@panow.com

On Twitter: @thiajames