SHARON, PA. Who ought to pay for span rebuid?

The matter of cost is likely to end in court.
By HAROLD GWIN
VINDICATOR SHARON BUREAU
SHARON, Pa. -- If the contractor on the Oakland Avenue Viaduct project wants to tear the nearly finished bridge down and start again, Mercer County officials say that's fine with them.
That is, as long as the contractor is prepared to cover the extra expense of that work, said Commissioners Gene Brenneman and Olivia Lazor.
The contractor, in a letter to the county this week, said unless a repair plan is agreed to immediately, it will begin dismantling the bridge Nov. 17 and rebuild it, but who will pay the additional cost will be a matter for the courts to decide.
The 300-foot span over the Shenango Valley Freeway is a county-owned bridge the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation and the federal government agreed to replace in 2001 for $3.6 million.
Misalignment
Carmen Paliotta Contracting Inc. of Library, Pa., won the contract to do the job and got to the point of pouring the structure's concrete deck when the county halted work in November 2001 because of a misalignment problem that gave the bridge a slight "S" shape.
It turned out that the eight concrete pedestals supporting the steel upper structure were not aligned properly, resulting in the twist.
No work has been done on the structure since then while the contractor, the county and PennDOT sought an acceptable method of correcting the alignment problem.
The county and PennDOT finally took a "get-tough" approach to the issue last week, notifying Paliotta that it must have a repair plan in place and approved by the state no later than Dec. 1 or PennDOT would take over the task of drafting a plan that the contractor would have to follow.
Paliotta responded with its own "get-tough" position in a letter this week from its attorney, D. Matthew Jameson III, in which the contractor again assailed the county and state for failing to approve any of its previously submitted corrective action plans.
The letter said that unless the county is able to agree to a repair plan immediately, the contractor thinks the only alternative is to take the bridge structure down and start over again.
Of course, that will result in litigation to determine who will pay the costs associated with that action, the letter said.
The demolition would begin Nov. 17, the letter said.
Both Brenneman and Lazor said today that they haven't seen the letter from Jameson but that they would have no objection to Paliotta's tearing down the bridge, replacing the pedestals and starting again.
"If they want to tear it down and rebuild it at no extra cost, fine," Brenneman said.
Both also said they fully expect the matter to wind up in court.
Paliotta has been paid $2.9 million for the work done on the bridge so far.
Mayor David O. Ryan said he thinks it unlikely that PennDOT will allow the contractor to tear the bridge down.