Work on seawall sinkhole to commence soon

According to the newly-promoted Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Public Infrastructure (MPI), Geoffrey Vaughn the ongoing replacement of the Liliendaal Bridge will not affect the soon-to-start work on the sinkhole at the Kitty seawall.

At present, traffic is closed off from the Liliendaal Bridge on the East Coast Railway Embankment for four months, and while traffic around Vlissengen Road, Kitty, will be closed off when work commences on the sinkhole, Vaughn stated that the two will not affect each other.

“They should not affect each other. When the work starts and Vlissengen Road is closed off, the other half will be opened, and when the other half towards the sea wall is closed off, then Vlissengen Road will be opened, and so none of the two will be done at the same time,” Vaughn explained to Stabroek News on Tuesday.

While the two projects will cause some small congestion because of redirected traffic, Vaughn said, “If you want development sometimes you must have some amount of hindrance. It doesn’t mean we want you to be hindered, but we have to do things so that it will not disturb your daily life.”

While the work on the seawall sinkhole was supposed to have started within the first week of this month, Vaughn explained that everything on the Ministry’s part was completed, and it’s now up to the contractor who, he said, “is probably procuring his materials and should start soon.”

A small sinkhole had initially developed in late December and since then, the MPI along with the M&CC had collaborated on the matter; enlarging it in order to apply a temporary fix to the problem. One of the engineers who was on site had explained to Stabroek News that the depression in the road which had resulted in the formation of the sinkhole, had been due to a galvanized pipe bursting and letting water under the road. As a result of the excess water interacting with the earth, the road had caved in, causing a traffic hazard on the thoroughfare.

Since then the city had applied a temporary fix to the pipe in order to prevent water from seeping into the road. However, a week after, a few more depressions appeared on the road, several feet away from the sinkhole, suggesting that the temporary fix was not addressing the main issue.

The $142M contract was awarded to Colin Talbot Contracting Services last month.