Beams arrive at Beaumont

A KEY MILESTONE HAS BEEN reached in the replacement of the 137-year-old Beaumont Bridge on State Highway 8 in the Clutha District.

Colin Mackay, Principal Project Manager for Waka Kotahi, says the first of the steel beams for the new bridge started arriving at the construction site at the end of July.

“All 20 main beams are being prefabricated in Napier, ahead of the truck trip 1200km south to Beaumont, a journey that could take up to five days. Two beams a week are being transported to the site over coming weeks,” says Mr Mackay.

Mr Mackay says several different components make up the main bridge beams, which vary in size and weight, creating spans of up to 40 metres. The beams will be stored on site until they are positioned on the new bridge structure from late September.

Once they reach the South Island, the trucks will travel south on State Highway 1 from Picton to Clarks Junction, just south of Milton. From there, they head inland on SH8 for the final 60km of their journey to Beaumont. A similar system has been successfully used over the last five years to move large beams to the sites of several new South Island highway bridges.

“While the truck drivers will pull over where possible throughout their journey, people need to build potential delays of up to 20 minutes into their travel plans. Waka Kotahi thanks everyone for their patience while these bridge beams are being transported over the next few weeks,” says Nicole Felts, Waka Kotahi Journey Manager.

The new, two-lane bridge will be 195 metres long, formed by curved steel girders, supported by four piers sitting about 12 metres above the average river level.

The weathering steel beams (with a rusty look) are high strength structural steel which form a corrosion-inhibiting surface and do not require maintenance.they continue to “weather”where they are positioned resulting in minimal maintenance costs and a more economic long-life bridge solution.

Safety barriers will be fitted on the road approaches and the new bridge incorporates a shared walking and cycling path.

Designed to modern earthquake standards, the new bridge will safely connect people, products, and places.

The 137-year-old existing single lane bridge forms an important link on SH8 between Dunedin, Central Otago, and Queenstown, but it is no longer well suited to today’s higher traffic volumes, or the larger and heavier trucks regularly using this route.

Construction started in January 2022 and is expected to be completed by bridge builder HEB Construction in late 2023.

T&D