New Alyth bridges are opened in ceremony
Replacement structures finally ready by next week
Councillor Ian Miller and Citizen of the Year Marie MacDonald at the link A special ceremony was held earlier this week to hail the completion of two replacement footbridges over the Alyth Burn.
Marie MacDonald, the town’s current Citizen of the Year, was given the honour of marking the milestone with Perth and Kinross Council leader Ian Miller on Wednesday, watched by local authority delegates, construction teams and locals.
The two town centre structures were required after the previous ones were damaged beyond repair during the devastating flooding which hit the area in July, 2015.
Barbara Renton, director of the council’s environment service, said: “I would like to take this opportunity to thank our partners and contractors for coming together to provide Alyth with their new replacement bridges – and also the local community for their patience while the work was being carried out.”
Gearoid Reidy, site manager for contractors NRS Group, added: “We are delighted to have been involved with this project to restore vital links for the community.”
Work on the structures got under way in January and, after the foundations were constructed, both footbridges were successfully lifted into place on February 26.
It is expected that the bridges will be able to be used by the public by the beginning of next week at the latest.
An anti-skid coating was initially meant to be applied to the ramps at the start of this week.
But the final piece of the jigsaw was delayed owing to the weather conditions.
Further follow-up work on the bridge decks has also been planned to take place in May.
Community surveys carried out at the beginning of last year indicated that a slim majority of locals favoured two new footbridges over an alternative option which could have seen three installed.
Work at the site was delayed due to the discovery of an unchartered live electricity cable on Commercial Street in December 2016.
The project also hit the headlines after a cherry tree – planted by the children of Alyth in 1953 and given to the town by the then Alyth Business and Merchants’ Association to commemorate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth – was uprooted and destroyed during the work.
At the time, the local authority said a new cherry tree would be planted in the vicinity of Pitnacree Street.