Bart Bear's Blog

They're building a new bridge at Bateman's Bay ("the bay" to us Canberrans). Bateman's Bay is on the Princes Highway, the coastal highway between Sydney and Melbourne. Before the first bridge was built in 1956 the only way for traffic to cross the Clyde river was by ferry. The river is over a kilometer wide at the crossing and the ferry trip took over a quarter of an hour. Peak-time traffic had long waits to cross. The first bridge was built with 5 fixed steel trusses and a lifting span in the middle. The lift span could be raised 75 feet above water level so that coastal shipping could pass up-river. It took about 5 minutes to raise or lower the span, so there were still occasional traffic holdups. Since commercial shipping died away, over the last years the bridge has been raised to let yachts and pleasure craft through. I never saw the bridge raised but Mum has had to wait for ships to pass through several times; she has also been on some cruise boats as they passed through the bridge. The bridge has only 2 lanes for traffic, has strict load limits and requires continuous maintenance, so work on a new bridge started in 2019. The new bridge is built of pre-cast concrete spans. It has 4 traffic lanes and a shared path for cyclists and pedestrians. The bridge structure is 12m above water level so most boats can pass under it. It may be open for traffic in the later months of this year. The Oldies took these pictures in December and they show the differences of the structures pretty well. I can't wait to try the new bridge, but I am sad that the old one will be removed.