Flood fears prompt bridge bids |27 April 2006

The town centre bridges are being blamed for slowing the flow of the rivers and streams passing through Victoria, forcing the water to back up and leading to floods which have caused thousands of rupees worth of damage to homes and commercial properties in and around the town in recent years.

Hoping to alleviate the problem, the Land Transport Division (LTD) has placed a series of adverts seeking tender bids for work on a total of eight bridges; three for pedestrians and five for use by vehicles.

Only locally registered companies are being invited to take part in the bidding process, being run by the National Tender Board, for which the deadline is Thursday, May 4.

“This did not just come out of the blue, it is the result of studies carried out by the Drainage Task Force,” said LTD’s senior road engineer Alderic Bristol.

The bridges set for reconstruction date back to Seychelles’ colonial period and most were built at the same time as the roads running through Victoria.

Mr Bristol said that many of the bridges are arc shaped, reducing the amount of water able to flow under them at times of flooding and that the rebuilding work will raise and straighten the underside of the bridges as well as widening them where possible.

“The bridges are part of the problem that was causing the flooding, but they are only a component of the bigger picture,” said Mr Bristol, as the Drainage Task Force turns its attention to problems further up stream.

He said that problems such as water source diversions and house building and other projects which remove tree cover and subsequently speed up surface run-off will be, “tackled at source.”

Once tendered out the work will get under way on water courses near Deepam Cinema, the Post Office and Central Police Station.

The work is expected to take around four months to complete.