One of the four lanes of the second Hooghly bridge will remain shut to traffic for four months from November to make way for replacing 16 “holding down” cables of the structure, popularly known as Vidyasagar Setu, the state government has decided.
At a meeting in Nabanna recently, which was presided over by chief secretary H.K. Dwivedi and attended by senior police officers and HRBC (Hooghly River Bridge Commissioners), which maintains the structure, it was decided that the cable replacement work will start from November 1.
The police will inform motorists about the closure in advance and there will be adequate deployment of personnel to ensure there is no traffic clog on the bridge.
Structural experts said the lane on the flank will have to be shut to traffic to complete the work of replacing the “holding down” cables. Vehicles will have to move in a single file.
The second Hooghly bridge has 152 cables in a fan arrangement using steel pylons.
There are two sets of pylons at two ends with their foundations underwater that hold the cables on the top.
These holding down cables lie inside the pylons at the two ends of the bridge and ensure that the cables above can hold the tension of the entire bridge structure, senior engineers of the HRBC said.
“These 16 cables were originally brought in from Germany. They are very crucial since they help the stay cables above to maintain the correct tension of the bridge in spite of heavy flow of vehicles throughout the day,” said a senior HRBC official.
“It’s a combination of these 16 cables and the 152 stay cables that comprise the Second Hooghly bridge.”
The officials of the HRBC said a team of engineers from a French engineering company was in Kolkata with their machinery for the cable replacement work.
“Once the cables inside the two pylons at the two ends of the bridge on the northern side are replaced, the team will take up the cables on the southern side,” one official said.
Senior police officers said since the engineers would require a traffic closure on one of the lanes for four months, it was decided that the period after the Pujas get over in October was best suited.
All those present at the meeting unanimously agreed upon the November 1 date, they added.
Spanning 823 metres, the second Hooghly bridge is the longest cable-stayed bridge in India.
Engineers from two companies — Freeman Fox and Partners and the Bharat Bhari Udyog Nigam Limited — had supervised the construction of the bridge, which took over 22 years to complete.
Inaugurated on October 10, 1992, the bridge handles close to 90,000 vehicles every day.