Massachusetts has expedited the project with work scheduled to start in the late fall.
Cars, trucks and school buses snarl the intersection at North Elm and Notre Dame streets with afternoon traffic just after dismissal at Westfield High School.WESTFIELD - Replacement of the Pochassic Street Bridge cannot come fast enough for Edward W. Laudato, of 3 Crown St.
“It has been a nightmare since the bridge closed last year,” Laudato told representatives of the state’s Department of Transportation at a public hearing on the estimated $5.6 million replacement project this week. “Can you expedite the project?” he asked.
Laudato and others in attendance at a hearing on Thursday pointed to travel restrictions for the Prospect, or “Drug Store” Hill, section of the city’s North Side during the past year.
The closing of the railroad viaduct bridge has forced school buses and other vehicles to access the area through the intersection of North Elm and Notre Dame streets to the north; many of the buses bound to and from the city’s south side to Westfield High School used the bridge.
The bridge is on Pochassic Street, just up the hill from North Elm Street, where a drug store was once located.
The state has already expedited the project with plans to advertise for construction bids in June and work scheduled to start in the late fall.
Routinely, bridge projects take years to complete. The nearby $57 million Great River Bridge construction and replacement, at the base of Pochassic Street, was in the planning stage for three decades before work started three years ago.
Tracy Wu, the state’s project manager for the Pochassic Bridge work, said, “We will try our best” in response to Laudato.
Wu explained to her audience that the replacement project will take about 2½ years to complete.
Daniel Lee and John J. Hayden, engineers with consulting firm of FST Engineers, of Burlington, told the crowd the project is ahead of schedule.
“An environmental review is not required for this project but there are sequential events that need to occur,” said Lee. “We are doing everything possible to shorten the time span.”
Pochassic Street Bridge was closed briefly several times during the past three years because of the Great River Bridge project. The state ordered it fully closed last January after testing revealed extensive structural deterioration. Plans are to replace the dry bridge that straddles the Pioneer Railroad and preserve its stone arch.
Funding for the project is expected to come from the Regional Transportation Improvement Plan program.
The project will include rehabilitation of the bridge and its adjoining brick arch on the east approach. That rehabilitation will include replacement of the steel span over the railroad tracks and construction of a new concrete span directly over the brick arch.