Briar Creek Park Bridge closed due to flood damage

Recent flood waters were enough to move the asphalt from this bridge at Briar Creek Park. The bridge will remain closed while officials determine the best way to repair it.

Briar Creek Park is back open after flooding damage last week, but the bridge inside the park is expected to be closed for at least a couple more weeks as officials try to figure out how best to repair it.

Williamsburg Mayor Roddy Harrison said Tuesday that estimates for the repair are running anywhere from $30,000 – $300,000, and he just doesn’t know what it will cost to make the repairs yet.

“I know it is going to be very expensive. The bridge is going to remain closed until I can find out a definitive answer on it,” Harrison said. “The park is open. You can come down from the El Dorado’s side, but you can’t go across the bridge. Only the bridge is closed. It will stay closed until I get a good answer.”

Harrison said that city maintenance workers have been hard at work getting the park cleaned up after the flooding, and that Danny Hoke with the Whitley County Detention Center was a great help bringing down several prisoners to help work.

Harrison said that the bridge at Briar Creek was the only significant damage that the city suffered during last week’s flooding.

“Water has come up in Briar Creek forever any time it floods,” Harrison noted. “What happened was after we got 10th Street out of the flood plain and raised the bridge the water had to back up and come down somewhere so Briar Creek is where it held it.”

Harrison said this is good in the sense that it kept 10th Street open and kept the city from having to close it and reroute traffic, especially school buses.

It was bad in the sense that it put a lot more pressure on that bridge in Briar Creek Park.

A Williamsburg maintenance worker uses this piece of equipment to scrape up dried mud and debris at Briar Creek Park Friday, following last week’s flood that damaged a bridge in the park. The bridge will likely to remain closed for a few more weeks.

“What it has done is collapse one side of the bridge in Briar Creek on one end,” Harrison said. “It is impassable right now.”

Harrison said that how much it costs to repair the bridge will in part depend on what the city does.

One option would involve laying down new asphalt over the bridge. Harrison said there are crossties on one end under the bridge, which he thinks need to be replaced.

“If we take those cross ties out we have to choke down that bridge to one lane. I don’t want to do that. I think we need to keep that bridge two lanes,” Harrison said.

Harrison said he has contacted several people including state transportation officials, and he is trying to get a bridge expert down, who can give an estimate on replacing or repairing the bridge to its pre-flood condition.

Harrison said he is also still waiting to hear from the city’s engineer.

He added this was the first big flood since 10th Street was raised out of the flood plain.