Thursday, August 21, 2003

By Joe Grata, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

It's a race to the finish on the 16th Street Bridge in Pittsburgh.

How close is the contractor, GASA Inc., to meeting a Sept. 14 midnight deadline to reopen at least one lane in each direction?

"We're pouring the last of the concrete now, and if we finish that by the Labor Day weekend, we'll probably make it," said Ben Moscatiello, GASA owner. "It's a struggle. The concrete needs 14 days to cure. Pray it doesn't rain."

Moscatiello may be praying, too, because if at least one lane isn't open in each direction by 12:01 a.m. Sept. 15, his company may have to pay a $10,000-a-day penalty for being late on the $9.8 million contract.

GASA officials met Tuesday with the Allegheny County Public Works Department about the status of rehabilitation work on the 80-year-old span over the Allegheny River, connecting the North Side and Strip District.

"GASA started working double shifts this week and [Moscatiello] thinks they can make it," department Director Tom Donatelli said yesterday. "The deck work taking place now is critical."

All four lanes, plus both sidewalks, are to be finished by Nov. 3. The contactor won't be penalized if the two lanes are reopened on time to help 11,000 drivers a day who have been detoured since last Nov. 4, most via the 31st Street Bridge.

Moscatiello said the firm encountered problems, not unexpected on old bridges.

"It's like opening up a can of worms," he said. "A lot of things were not foreseen at the time of bidding."

In addition, the county changed specifications for the bridge railings, installing the new "see-through" style at the behest of the Riverlife Task Force, a group dedicated to preserving and enhancing the city's river corridors. The "Pennsylvania Barrier" will preserve scenic views of the Allegheny River and Pittsburgh that would have been lost had the county not substituted it for a 32-inch-high solid concrete barrier called for in the original contract.

After the opening, GASA will continue working on sidewalks, railings, curbs, lights and painting. Aztec gold paint, the same as on the Fort Pitt, West End, Clemente, Seventh Street and Ninth Street bridges, is being used for the first time on the 16th Street Bridge.

Historic preservationists made a request, too late, to investigate and restore the bridge to its original color, as the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation did on the Smithfield Street Bridge in the mid-1990s. The county had already put the contract out to bid.

Besides a new deck, sidewalks, draining, lights, guardrail, signs and paint, the 16th Street Bridge also has undergone minor structural buttressing and repairs.

Transportation officials' original game plan called for rehabilitating the nearby, dilapidated 31st Street Bridge after the 16th Street Bridge was finished. That work has now been pushed back to spring 2005 at the earliest.

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