LCRA gives OK to explosive Marble Falls bridge demolition

The U.S. 281 bridge in Marble Falls is set for demolition in a few weeks. And because the Lower Colorado River Authority granted a waiver to its ban on using explosives in the Colorado River, taking down the bridge likely will be a noisy affair.

The waiver is good only between March 17 and April 8, according to a letter Thursday to the Texas Department of Transportation from Don Brent, the authoritys public safety chief. The waiver is contingent, Brent wrote, on TxDOT by March 7 notifying the authority and other government agencies of its demolition plans and on the demolition contractor getting a permit from the state fire marshall.

The demolition requires written authorization as well from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, a document that would include recommendations for minimizing the demolitions effect on wildlife, department spokeswoman Lydia Saldana said. Assuming TxDOT gives the wildlife department information needed to formulate those suggestions, we anticipate approving it, Saldana said.

Although a specific date has not been set, TxDOT plans to do the initial, primary blast between March 17 and 23, said Kelli Reyna, spokeswoman for TxDOTs Austin district.

TxDOT had asked for the waiver so that its contractor, Archer Western, could explosively destroy the 80-year-old, 950-foot-long bridge over Lake Marble Falls. TxDOT has already built a new northbound bridge alongside the old two-way bridge, and diverted traffic in both directions onto the new bridge pending completion of a southbound bridge.

The river authority granted the waiver, spokeswoman Clara Tuma said, because TxDOT satisfied our concerns about lake safety. The lake area by the bridge will be closed for several hours before, during and after the initial blasting operations.

The authority will open that section to boating only after debris has been fished from the lake and officials are satisfied that use of the lake is safe, Tuma said.

Workers have begun to remove lighting and guardrails, and should start next week taking off the concrete and asphalt bridge deck and part of the old bridges substructure in preparation for the initial demolition. Reyna said there could one or more minor demolition blasts to follow during the waiver period.

Archer Western will build the new bridge for the southbound lanes. The $30 million project will leave the two bridges with four lanes as was the case with the old bridge but the new bridge will have with wider sidewalks and ample shoulder lanes. It should be complete in late 2014.

This part of the Colorado River has been the site of a large blast before. The LCRA in 1951 explosively demolished an old dam just upstream of U.S. 281, an event that drew reporters from across the state and a crowd of as many as 15,000 people. To see a short film about that event, go to http://www.lcra.org/featurestory/2011/oldmarblefallsdamdemo.html.

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LCRA gives OK to explosive Marble Falls bridge demolition