Palace Bridge Repairs to Start
Published: October 10, 2012 (Issue # 1730)
Repairs to St. Petersburg’s celebrated Dvortsovy (Palace) Bridge are due to start in the middle of October, Boris Murashov, head of the city’s Transport Development Committee said last week, Interfax reported.
During the repair work, only four lanes of the bridge will be open to traffic.
“Palace Bridge is safe for traffic but its lifting machinery is in urgent need of attention,” Murashov said.
The construction of the span dates back to 1916 and cracks in it “may appear at any moment,” Murashov said. Therefore it is not possible to postpone the repair work until the next navigation season, he said.
The company Pilon is to reconstruct the bridge at a cost of 2.7 billion rubles ($866.5 million). Under the terms of the tender, the reconstruction work is scheduled to last from between 470 to 627 days.
Named after the nearby Winter Palace, Palace Bridge is a cast-iron bascule bridge that spans the Bolshaya Neva River, connecting the central part of the city to Vasilyevsky Island.
Construction of the bridge began just before World War I and was completed in 1916. For some time after the 1917 Revolution, the bridge was called Respublikansky, but later its historical name was restored.