Detour sought for bridge work

Beaver Creek Road residents may have found an opening in the planned three month closure of the A.G. Hanson Bridge over the Elochoman River.

Wahkiakum County officials met Tuesday evening with owners of property along a private road connecting Beaver Creek Road with a privately owned bridge over the Elochoman above the Hanson bridge to see if they would reach an agreement for limited public use of the route.

Wednesday morning, Commission Chair Dan Cothren said all landowners were cooperating for the detour, including the state Department of Natural Resources, which had a 100-foot strip.

Road use will be limited to people who live or work up Beaver Creek Road, he said. People will be notified by reverse 9-1-1 phone calls; others may find information on the county's website or through the sheriff's office information hotline, 795-3911.

Cothren said a county crew will go over the road today (Thursday) to make sure it's passable for cars, and it should be open Thursday or Friday.

The county has contracted with Five Rivers Construction to raise and repair the bridge, which has been severely damaged in winter freshets.

Until two weeks ago, county officials anticipated the contractor would be able to provide at least a foot bridge for residents to traverse the river to use vehicles parked at either side. However, at the preconstruction conference two weeks ago, Five Rivers said liability insurance concerns prohibited it from providing a footpath through the construction zone.

That left Beaver Creek Road and Bradley Mountain residents looking at a 20-mile drive into Cowlitz County and down Mill Creek Road to SR 4 to reach Cathlamet. Paving work scheduled to start soon will complicate travel, too.

Fire District 4 and Wahkiakum Emergency Medical Services arranged to have a fire truck and ambulance parked on the far side of the bridge, with emergency services personnel allowed to pass through the construction zone.

However, other traffic was left with the long detour to Mill Creek. Cathlamet Post Master Wendy Blix notified area residents that the US Postal Service doesn't have funds to pay for another carrier to work the route, so the residents would have to come to the Cathlamet post office to collect their mail.

Beaver Creek Road residents filled the commissioners meeting room Tuesday morning for an hour-long discussion of the situation.

Several people leveled sharp criticism at Commissioners Cothren, Blair Brady and Lisa Marsyla and Public Works Director Pete Ringen for not including a temporary bypass bridge in the contract.

Shirley Rose was one of several to ask why the temporary bridge wasn't in the contract.

"Isn't that your job, to think ahead?" she asked. "We, as a group who live up Beaver Creek, feel we don't matter . . . We elected you to office to look out for our interests. We do count. It hurts us as a community."

She asked that the contract be suspended until the temporary bridge could be included.

Other residents spoke of potential difficulties. One man reported his wife is pregnant and will deliver this fall, and the closure will hamper their ability to respond to that situation. Aaron Roberts, Department of Fish and Wildlife Lower Columbia Hatchery Complex manager, said crews using the Beaver Creek Hatchery will have extra travel, a major expense for that operation.

"At the very least, we need a way for foot traffic to cross the bridge," he said.

Ray Mogush said families with school children and children with developmental disabilities will be severely limited if they have to use the Mill Creek route.

Ringen said a variety of factors led him to leave a temporary bridge out of the contract. First, state and federal sources are paying for the project as a disaster relief and emergency repair project. In his experience, those sources will only fund a temporary bridge on a dead end road. Second, the county would have to pay the cost of the temporary bridge, $100,000 or more, and it would take one to two years to get it permitted.

The county and others have worked hard to save the bridge during the freshets, he added, and if the project is delayed another winter season, more flooding could close the bridge.

"I hear your concerns loud and clear," he said. "We needed to do a better job communicating. I'll take the responsibility. I don't know if the outcome would have been different."

Commissioner Marsyla noted she is new to the board and believed until the preconstruction conference, like the other two commissioners, that the pedestrian passage would be possible.

About 40 minutes into the discussion, Henry Johnson announced the private bridge over the Elochoman upstream from the Hanson Bridge could be a detour route. The bridge is sound, he said, and it connects with a road that connects with the Beaver Creek Road.

The problem, he said, is that he and three other parties, including Mogush, own property along the route and would have to give their permission for a route.

"You have mine," Mogush said.

Commissioners said they would contact the landowners Tuesday afternoon to see if they would make easements available to the county.

Cothren said he knew of the route but hadn't suggested it because he believed Johnson's bridge couldn't handle public traffic and some property owners had issues with public traffic.