The Albany County Executive’s Office on Monday, July 6, closed the Jericho Road bridge over the CSX Rail Yards in Selkirk, and according to County Spokeswoman Mary Duryea, with a $16 million price tag to replace and $1 million price tag to remove, the bridge is slated to be destroyed.
The county sent a detailed report to the state’s Department of Transportation, outlining the current state of the bridge and the cost analysis of repairing, replacing and removing it.
Duryea said after a recent bridge inspection, it was recommended that the county close the nearly 90-year-old bridge due to the corrosion of several critical steel members.
Duryea said there are no plans to build a new one.
Our department worked with design consultants Clough Harbour, she said. `The recommendation was to remove that bridge but that still needs to be approved by the state’s Department of Transportation.`
Duryea said, `It will no longer be in use and alternative routes will be suggested,` such as routes 32 and 396.
Albany County Department of Public Works Commissioner Michael Franchini said the bridge was a known issue because of its age, and, as a result, it was inspected annually instead of every two years.
`This isn’t a surprise, it’s an 86-year-old bridge,` he said. `It was inspected by the DOT on the last week of June and the DOT found some issues and problems all relating to corrosion and the loss of steel.`
Although cost is a factor in such a decision, Franchini said public safety is the county’s main priority.
`We try to make these decisions based on safety,` he said, but added that both the cost and the logistics to build a new bridge are prohibitive.
`It will cost at least $16 million to replace that bridge,` Franchini said. `The cost is just too high. … It’s not like you can just close down the rail yards and build a bridge. It would be quite the opposite, actually.`
However, it was safety concerns in terms of emergency response times that ignited vocal support to re-open the bridge over 20 years ago. The Jericho Road bridge was re-named in 1993 in honor of Ben Giovannetti, a South Albany Road resident, who started a grass-roots campaign to save and repair the bridge. He died in the summer of 1987 before seeing the bridge re-open.
In January of 1989, Robert H. Rienow, a nationally renowned environmentalist and founder of the state’s Audubon Society, died inside of his home on Rarick Road after embers from a woodstove set a showcase ablaze. His property is now a large environmental preserve.
Former Selkirk fire commissioner Charles Fritts told The Spotlight then that, although it may not have changed the outcome of Rienow’s death, an open Jericho Road bridge may have helped save some of the structure that burned down.
Fritts said a fire hydrant on the other side of the closed bridge reduced water reloading time by five to 10 minutes.
The first responder on the scene was former Selkirk assistant fire chief Craig Apple, now the Albany County undersheriff.
Apple said on Wednesday, July 8, he `remembers the incident well,` and that the fire was fully active when he arrived and little could be done for Rienow. He directed another firefighter with the proper gear to Rienow’s whereabouts after making two attempts to locate him without any fire equipment. Apple was given a citation of appreciation from then Albany County Executive James Coyne and former Albany County Sheriff George Infante.
Coyne told The Spotlight on Wednesday, July 8, that he remembers the controversy over the bridge closure.
`I remember that same question came up back then,` Coyne said. `As I recall, there was a pretty good outpouring of people who were concerned over their emergency response times.
`It was more of a safety issue than anything,` he said.
Fire officials today say the bridge’s 15-ton weight limit already prohibits big pumper trucks, so there will be no change in their coverage of the area. First responders, however, could see some delays by not accessing the bridge.
`It’s nothing we haven’t dealt with since they imposed the weight limit on that bridge,` said Selkirk Fire Chief William Borger. `It’s an inconvenience, but it won’t change anything for us. It’s going to affect the police department and EMS department because they’ll have to take the long way, too.`
The new detour signs tell residents to use Route 32 (Feura Bush Road), and Franchini said Route 396 (Bridge Street) is also a viable option. Nothing is permanent at this point until there is final state approval, which according to Franchini will take `a couple of months` because of the detail involved in the technical report.
One of the people in the ’80s who spoke out to re-open the bridge and pushed for the major repairs from 1990-91 was Michael Fahey.
`The 1986-1991 effort to get the Jericho Bridge repaired and reopened was a hard-fought battle, waged by the persistent residents of the South Albany Road neighborhood,` he said. `All the letters, protests, phone calls, petitions, meetings and visits to the county legislature all of a sudden became worth it once the traffic began flowing across the bridge again.`
Christine Frankovic lives around the corner from the 1,100-foot long bridge and said she remembers participating in a protest to re-open it when she was a little girl.
She has written to many local officials, including Albany County Executive Michael Breslin, Franchini and Albany County Legislator Richard Mendick about not scrapping the bridge.
`I use this bridge daily to get to my job in downtown Albany. I also remember clearly 20 years ago the battle with government that took five years to get the bridge re-opened after damage had been done to the bridge,` she wrote.
Franchini said that CSX, then Con Rail, did chip in for the 1990 repair of the bridge and that he understands the frustration of local residents who use the bridge everyday.
`Going two miles north or south isn’t really an inconvenience overall. There are two new bridges only miles away,` Franchini said. `I know for the people next to the bridge it’s not small, but it’s small in the bigger picture.`
“