Jackhammers tackle a ‘pig of a block’

The 850-tonne block of concrete that formed the counterweight for the old Johnson Street Bridge is about two-thirds gone after several days of jackhammering.

A second industrial-sized jackhammer unit was added to the job along the way.

“It’s a pig of a block to get off,” said Jonathan Huggett, the bridge project manage. “That concrete’s 90 years old.”

The jackhammers have been going from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily, he said, and the task has progressed well.

“I’m hoping they’re going to finish it next week,” he said. “Because we’ve still got work to do to get the steel prepped so that we can come back on the 22nd and lift the remaining steel out.”

Huggett said the most visible element left from what was once the old bridge is the tower on the east side.

“There’s five big pieces of steel that have got to be lifted off, so it’s probably three days’ work,” he said. “It’s already pretty open down there now, it has a different feel.

“Once that tower’s gone the view is going to be spectacular.”

He said the May 22 date for starting the removal of the pieces is “pretty fluid,” in part because of the demand for the huge crane — known as the Dynamic Beast — needed to lift the bridge parts.

“All the time we’re kind of secondguessing when we can reserve a slot in that schedule that the crane’s got.”

The Dynamic Beast is based in Vancouver and comes to Victoria by barge. Huggett said it will definitely be back before the end of May.

He said that shutdowns of the new Johnson Street Bridge during the upcoming removal effort could be limited.

“I’m hopeful that we won’t have to do much in the way of closures, because this time we can lift [pieces] away from the existing bridge.”

Huggett said the new bridge has been performing well, although some people think it is being lifted unnecessarily when no marine traffic is in the area.

It’s actually because training of bridge operators is continuing, he said.

“We’re having to still do certification of our operators because we want to train about eight or nine.”

An industrial-sized jackhammer removes concrete from the counterweight of the old Johnson Street Bridge on Friday. The job is about two-thirds complete.