OCEAN CITY — After some overnight maintenance closures last month, the Route 50 Bridge got a clean bill of health this week and no further issues are expected this season.
In mid-April, the Route 50 bridge was closed overnight from 10 p.m. to 6:30 a.m. on a Friday to facilitate the repair of the grated section of the draw span. That project led to the discovery of some other issues that needed addressing and the State Highway Administration (SHA) returned the following week for multiple days of overnight closures.
This week, SHA officials briefed the Mayor and Council on the bridge.
“The Route 50 bridge is completed,” said SHA District Engineer Jay Meredith. “It was an inconvenience, but we got in there and got it done. What the issue was initially is that there is grate at the fixed span of the bridge that was warped up and we were afraid if somebody went across the bridge and hooked into that grate with a light trailer or a chain hanging down or something, it could cause a lot of damage. We wanted to get that issue resolved before the summer season.”
As far as the subsequent closures, Meredith explained that work needed to be done with the draw span open.
“They weren’t structural defects, but there were things that needed to be taken care of,” he said. “It’s better to do it now than taking a chance of something happening in July.”