Good News As Trusan Bridge Nears Completion
B andar Seri Begawan - The local population will be happy to hear that Trusan Bridge in Lawas is 90 per cent complete, which means their road journey time to Kota Kinabalu, Sabah will be slashed considerably when it opens.
At present, it takes those five to six hours to reach KK from Bandar Seri Begawan, depending on the time taken to wait for the ferry to cross the Trusan River. During holiday periods, such as school term breaks, it may take them an extra three to four hours queuing as they spend time in cars at the riverbank waiting for their turn to enter the ferry.
Recent newspaper reports stated that the bridge may be completed as early as May, but it would only be operational in July after all the security requirements are met. July's opening will be fine for Bruneians who normally choose to go to KK during school holidays, which will be about two weeks in September and one month in December.
"It would be better if it can be opened in June, as the second term break will be from June 4 to June 20," a Bruneian said. Sarawakians also hope that the bridge can be opened in June in time for the Gawai Dayak and Pesta Lun Bawang (Irau Aco) festival holiday rush.
Spanning 420 metres and 10.2m wide, and costing RM29.5 million, the completed bridge will be a welcome sight for travellers who all this while, had to wait for their turn to cross Trusan River by ferry, with long queues of vehicles during festive seasons.
Travellers may not need to pay a toll to use the bridge, as it is a government project and not initiated by the private sector, said an officer in Lawas who declined to be named.
Previously, seasoned travellers would groan during festive seasons as the long wait to cross the river could take up to three to four hours during the peak but the authorities have recently allowed two ferries to operate simultaneously when the situation arose last year.
Travellers from Brunei also complained about queue-jumping usually done by Malaysian-registered vehicles even though some Brunei-registered vehicles did the same too. "Many of us did not want to create trouble by queue-jumping as we were in foreign territory. We also did not dare to object," they said.
Meanwhile, local newspaper reports stated that the bridge could be delivered earlier as concreting works on the second last span of the bridge on land has already started while bridge rails on the last span are being put up by the contractor.
"This is the easy part as the contractor has already tackled the main structural construction challenge in the central beam in the Trusan River, and the concreting works on the last section of the bridge are on land," a source familiar with the project was quoted as saying.
The project is slightly behind schedule and the completion date is slated for July 2010, following the automatic three months extension given by the Malaysian government following the economic downturn to assist badly affected contractors in the country.
Prices of materials skyrocketed and cash flow of construction companies were badly affected, which resulted in an overall slowdown of projects including the Trusan Bridge. The initial completion date of Trusan Bridge was December last year.
The project included piling works of the two piers in the fast-flowing Trusan River, where the contractors faced the fickle river conditions of low and high water levels, including the major floods that hit Lawas last year.
The Trusan Bridge is the missing link in the Pan Borneo highway in Sarawak, between Kuching in the south and Lawas in the north that leads to Sabah, and long-base cargo lorries can gobble up all the space on the Trusan ferry in each crossing.
Thousands, including those from Brunei, cross this stretch during weekends, public and school holidays in the inter-state travel through Sarawak, Brunei and Sabah, and the flow would turn into a torrent during festive seasons such as Hari Raya, Christmas and school holidays in the Sultanate. --
Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin
Written by Rosli Abidin Yahya /Friday, 23 April 2010 07:01
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