Cracks in bridge force extended lane closure

Cracks in the deck of a bridge that provides one of the main routes for drivers in and out of a city have been discovered, engineers have said.

One lane on Bridge Road, near Countess Wear, Exeter, has been closed for a week and that closure is now being extended for engineers to carry out repair works.

Devon County Council engineer Simon Hill said: "We've got an aluminium deck that is starting to corrode and break up and is no longer supported underneath."

The council said it hoped work to fix problems now would help to avoid closing the bridge entirely in the future.

The 54-year-old bridge goes over Exeter canal and runs alongside the swing bridge. Both bridges move when necessary to allow marine traffic in and out.

Hill said: "If you leave it any longer without any further support or remedial work, then eventually the deck will start to bow and give, and then we would have to close the whole bridge, rather than an isolated lane as we've done at the moment."

He said the investigatory and repair work was expected to take a week and would all be going on underneath the bridge.

Devon County Council said it understood people's frustration about the lane closure on one of the city's busiest roads, but said the "deterioration now being seen" had to be dealt with "to prevent more serious problems developing".

The council said it was currently looking at ways of replacing both bridges which it said were originally built as temporary structures and were "increasingly prone to faults".

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