Suffolk County Council has admitted that the Gull Wing bridge at Lake Lothing in Lowestoft will not open until next year.
The £125m bridge, which is funded with £73m from the Local Growth Fund and will provide a third crossing over Lake Lothing, was scheduled to open ‘Mid/Late 2023’.
The council said contractor Farrans has applied for an extension of the closure of Denmark Road to allow for the completion of the highways works on the northern side of Lake Lothing but that construction of the bridge itself ‘continues to make good progress’.
It said the bridge will open to the public in 2024 after installation of the main bascule span in the new year, ‘pending agreement with Associated British Ports’.
However, the website for the project gives the date for that element of the construction as ‘Early/Mid 2023’.
Seven of the bridge’s eight spans have been lifted into place, the concreting of the bridge deck slabs is well underway on both sides of Lake Lothing, and the new control room at the top of the control tower is under construction, the council said.
The plant room building is also currently being fitted out with the power supply, hydraulic pumps, communications equipment, and other building services.
The giant ‘J’ beams and bridge deck, which are currently being fabricated and assembled in Belgium and the Netherlands, will arrive by sea.
The council said that during installation and commissioning of the bascule span, ‘the final and most complex major element of this unique and challenging project’, the navigation channel is expected to close for three weeks.
This will be followed by a short period of time for final commissioning and for staff to be trained in the operating of the bridge before opening.
Project director Simon Bretherton said: ‘A clearer view of the timetable for its completion and opening will emerge as we undertake that final major component during a closure of the main navigation channel in the new year.’
He said the bridge would be ‘a complex and challenging infrastructure project at the best of times’, but that he would ‘say nothing’ of what he said were ‘the challenges of COVID and the global supply issues we have faced in the past few years’.
He added: ‘We will continue to work with our contractor, Farrans, to complete the remaining works as quickly as we can. Although there will continue to be some disruption in the short term, the long-term benefits of the new bridge will be felt for many decades to come.’
The road closure, which began on 1 March and was due to last ‘no longer than six months, is now expected to be in place until the end of October’.
The authority said the building of the new northern roundabout and approach road to the bridge, including new drainage, attenuation ponds, and utilities works, is taking longer than previously estimated.
