Traffic will be maintained on the Shenango Valley Freeway during the project.

Traffic will be maintained on the Shenango Valley Freeway during the project.
By HAROLD GWIN
VINDICATOR SHARON BUREAU
SHARON, Pa. -- It's been 12 years in the making, but the Oakland Avenue Viaduct spanning the Shenango Valley Freeway is finally being replaced.
Mercer County, which owns the 314-foot long structure, began planning for its replacement in 1988.
A series of delays -- including having the bridge designated as a state historical structure, which required studies and detailing of its architecture -- pushed the project back, but the job will begin within a couple of weeks.
Final design plans were completed last fall, and the county commissioners awarded a $3.56 million contract a week ago to Carmen Paliotta Contracting of South Park, Pa., to tear down the 65-year-old bridge and put up a new one.
Mark Miller, county bridge engineer, said 80 percent of the cost is being picked up by the federal government, and the state is covering the rest, so no local tax dollars will be spent on the job.
Miller said he will have a pre-construction conference with the contractor Monday, and work should begin within a couple of weeks.
To be closed: The bridge will be closed at that point, but traffic on the four-lane Shenango Valley Freeway some 60 feet below will be maintained as much as possible, Miller said.
The freeway will have to be shut down for a couple of days during the demolition phase when the concrete arches are imploded and again during part of the steel erection for the new bridge, but the plan is to have one lane open for northbound and southbound traffic during the construction, although there may be occasional brief lane closures, he said.
The job is to be completed in November.
The old bridge is primarily made of concrete and that has posed some maintenance problems over the years.
The county did some extensive work there in the 1970s, including replacing the bridge deck in 1978 because of concrete deterioration.
Chunks of concrete began falling off the arches onto the freeway in the mid-1980s, damaging vehicles, until the county had heavy screening attached to the bottom of the arches to hold the decaying material in place.
Miller said the new bridge will be primarily all steel except for a concrete deck. The original bridge replaced in 1936 was also mostly steel.
Weight limit: The bridge has a 16-ton weight limit, but the new structure will have an "unrestricted" designation, meaning that it can support loads of up to 40 tons, Miller said.
Mayor Robert T. Price said he is pleased the bridge is being replaced, and that his major concern now is getting traffic patterns in place so that the disruption causes as little traffic congestion as possible.
The mayor said he has asked the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation to put up temporary traffic lights at the intersection of Budd Street and Stambaugh Avenue for drivers seeking an alternative route around the work site.
Price said he is also pleased PennDOT chose to delay intersection improvement work on the freeway north of the bridge to avoid adding to the traffic flow problems the viaduct project will create.