ROANOKE RAPIDS — After months of delay due to Federal Emergency Management Agency floodplain issues in Northampton County, the long awaited pedestrian footbridge spanning the the tailrace canal at the Roanoke Rapids Dam is in place.

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The 120-plus-foot footbridge was a requirement for the re-licensing of the dam by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. It will be open to the public sometime next week.

The project was to be complete by the first of the year, however due to floodplain issues Northampton County required further studies by Dominion Power North Carolina.

The steel bridge was originally to be installed last November according to Steve Neschleba, a sales engineer with Contech Construction Products Inc., which built the bridge. Neschleba said the concrete support base on the Northampton side of the canal had to be moved because of the floodplain concerns, which meant his company had to cut the 110-foot bridge and add approximately 14 feet to the bridge after it had already been finished.

Workers from Contech and two other companies involved in the planning and installation of the bridge have been on site since last week preparing to lift the 46,000-pound span into place across the canal.

The bridge has been sitting in two sections behind the Roanoke Rapids Dam for several days as IQ Contracting completed work on the concrete support structures on both sides of the canal.

Ray Edwards, of Dominion Power, has been coordinating and facilitating the efforts of the outside companies involved in the project. All parties were on-site Tuesday to perform the final lift and put the bridge in place, but high winds pushed the lift off until Wednesday he said. “The airport reported winds up to 30-miles per hour yesterday,” Edwards said, “The crane operator said he can handle winds up to 22 MPH.”

Early Wednesday morning, everything was in place and Dominion’s Edwards was helping direct curious employees into safe areas to observe the final lift. A 500-ton crane towered over the site, dwarfing the 50-ton crane used to lift and pour the concrete supports. Edwards Crane Service was contracted to do the heavy lifting.

As IQ Contracting employees readied the concrete supports, Contech workers finished bolting the two sections of the bridge together. They checked and double-checked everything on the bridge as other employees from Edwards Inc. worked to attach the heavy lifting straps to the bridge and the crane’s huge hook.

Finally with a twirl of his hand pointing up, the crane operator spooled the crane’s cable and slowly lifted the bridge. Making the still gusting, cold wind seem irrelevant, he slowly and steadily lifted the bridge high over the trees that stand beside the canal and gently placed the bridge onto it’s support bases. The entire lift took only 15 minutes.

Once the nuts were tightened onto the bolts, smiling workers began crossing the bridge. Ray Edwards said he was pleased with how well the lift had gone and was not surprised there were no problems setting the bridge on the supports. “We had two companies check all the clearances and measurements. We knew the bolts were one-quarter inch off on one side, but the slots on the bridge mounts easily made up for that,” Edwards said.

The new bridge will allow access by pedestrians to the north side of the tailrace canal.

The bridge will be a great half-mile addition to the Roanoke Canal Trail, Edwards said, since the only access to the bridge is from the trail, at the Roanoke Rapids Dam access point. There are no signs up yet, Edwards said the bridge will not be open to the public until next week, since landings and stair railings have not been completed.