Canso Causeway swing bridge debugged
Problems with locking swing bridge back into place
A lot of the bugs have been worked out of the new system in place at the recently retrofitted Canso Causeway swing bridge, a department official says.
The project involved modernizing infrastructure that was more than 60 years old, noted Gerard Jessome, district director with the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal. There were several lengthy closures of the only road link between Cape Breton Island and mainland Nova Scotia this summer as operators encountered problems trying to lock the swing bridge back into place after opening it to allow marine traffic to pass through the Canso Canal.
“It was really a new system, we changed the existing system to an automated system, a computer-run system,” Jessome said.
“There was some issues in the initial stages, so through troubleshooting and getting some experts involved we were able to find some new components that were installed
that weren’t working correctly and we replaced those components.”
The last issue affecting marine traffic took place Sept 10. Jessome said the next day
a component was replaced.
A manager is looking at ways to better troubleshoot any problems that may occur in the future, and better determine their
source. That will include improved software, Jessome said.
“The bridge is 1960-vintage, so to transfer that bridge into a fully automated system, I guess they can expect there would be some problems and some bugs that have to be worked out,” he said.
The Cape Breton Post requested an updated figure for the amount the department has spent to date on the bridge retrofit but it was not available by deadline. Originally, it was expected to cost about $9 million.
Jessome said there were also occasionally some issues with the previous system. He said there was a learning curve associated with training the bridge operators, who were very experienced on the older system.
“That progressed over the summer, but that was the process that we had to go through,” Jessome said.
He added he’s not saying there will not be future issues at the bridge, but he does expect it to continue to be more reliable.
“We certainly understand the frustrations of the folks in the local area and understand the importance to maintain that link to Cape Breton and the mainland, for sure,” Jessome said.