Swallows to delay Fox River bridge
Duluth News Tribune, MN – Jun 8, 2014
Associated Press
NEENAH, Wis. – A bridge project in Neenah has gone to the birds.
The Oak Street bridge will take at least an extra two months to complete because of the arrival of hundreds of nesting cliff and barn swallows.
The birds aren’t expected to change the route of the Fox Cities Marathon on Sept. 24, but they’ve certainly ruffled feathers of city officials because the birds are federally protected.
The swallows have built mud nests on the temporary support structure on the underside of the new $5.6 million bridge.
“The falsework will stay there until the swallow nesting period is completed,” said Bill Bertrand, project manager for the state Department of Transportation’s regional office in Green Bay.
The birds are expected to continue nesting through August 20. It means that motorists will have to continue using another detour to get across the Fox River.
Bertrand said the bridge contractor can continue to work above the bridge deck, but he said it will have another two months of work after the falsework is removed.
The bridge was expected to open at the end of July, several months ahead of schedule.
“Everything had been so favorable that we thought we would have an early opening, and then this comes along,” Neenah Mayor George Scherck said.
Cliff and barn swallows like to nest on manmade structures like bridges, and aren’t part of a larger conspiracy, as Scherck joked.
“Even the birds are against us here,” Scherck said. “If it wasn’t so sad, you would probably laugh.”
