Bridge demolition slated for next month
The Greenkill Avenue span above Broadway in Midtown is being taken down and replaced.
Demolition of the Greenkill Avenue bridge above Broadway in Midtown is expected to begin in the first half of November, City Engineer Ralph Swenson said Tuesday.
And “by the end of the year, the bridge should be gone,” he said.
The demolition will begin with the removal of steel from the bridge, Swenson said. He said the work will be done at night over a period of a couple of days and will require closing a piece of Broadway.
Contractors then will remove concrete and nearby billboards, which will not force the closure of Broadway, the engineer said.
The bridge is being torn down to make way for a replacement. The city has signed a $2.03 million contract with Bette & Cring Construction Group for both the demolition and construction.
Also, a “resident engineer” will oversee the day-today construction at the site, which is between the Ulster Performing Arts Center and the YMCA.
The entire project, including construction of the new bridge, is expected to take about a year.
The city initially estimated the project would cost $3.5 million, but the highest submitted bid was for just under $2.8 million. Bette & Cring’s $2.03 million bid was the lowest.
New York state is expected to cover about 95 percent of the cost.
The Greenkill Avenue bridge was built in 1952, is about 86 feet long and is used by about 4,000 vehicles per day, according to a study conducted last year. It’s being replaced due to deterioration deemed to serious to repair.
The city has long resisted closing the bridge because doing so would force more traffic to onto the alreadybusy Broadway corridor. Now that the replacement project is going forward, the city will establish and announce a preferred detour for drivers to use. For drivers heading east on Greenkill Avenue, there are four available left turns that will take them to Cedar Street after one block. Taking Cedar Street east leads to Broadway, and Cedar becomes Cornell Street on the other side.