Buffalo, NY (WBEN) The road work signs are going up on three major WNY roadways in the coming days as bridge inspections are taking place. They won't happen during rush hour.
Ryan Whalen of NYSDOT says closures are happening on the following bridges:
Skyway (State Route 5): Right lane closures in both directions from Tuesday, October 7, through Thursday, October 9. Closures will occur for approximately eight hours throughout the day but will not occur between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m. eastbound or between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. westbound.
Scajaquada Expressway (State Route 198): Right and left lane closures in both directions from the Kensington Expressway (State Route 33) to Parkside Avenue from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, October 11, and Sunday, October 12.
Kensington Expressway (State Route 33): Right and left lane closures westbound in the vicinity of the Best Street bridge on Tuesday, October 7, and Wednesday, October 8. Closures will occur for approximately eight hours throughout the day but will not occur between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m. westbound or between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. eastbound.
Whalen says this is something NYSDOT does regularly, just to make sure the safety and the structural integrity of the bridges are there. "In general, we will do this at least once every two years. If we have all the bridges, it could be even more often than that, but people going out and just making sure that they're checking every point of those bridges and that they're safe for people to continue to drive on regularly," explains Whalen.
Whalen says emergency bridge work in West Seneca did not affect the scheduling of these bridge inspections. "These were already scheduled, so that didn't have any impact on these already scheduled bridge inspections. They had already been planned and out to bid, and we already had people scheduled to come in," notes Whalen.
Inspections take place every two years.