ATLANTA — Thursday marks one year since a massive fire damaged a bridge in the middle of Cheshire Bridge Road, leading to its eventual demolition.
Over the past year, drivers have been taking detours to get to work and home, and businesses in the area have struggled due to a lack of traffic along the road; some businesses have even closed.
On Wednesday, construction was visibly underway as crews poured concrete for the foundation of a new bridge.
"We would go eat at Taqueria del Sol every day and just walk across the bridge and now we have to take a 15 minute detour. To get to anything across the bridge is a problem," said Judd Swartzberg, while pointing across the creek the bridge once covered.
Swartzberg's family owns Swartz Co Commercial Real Estate. The company owns and has its offices in a retail property with multiple storefronts next to the bridge.
"We have had tenants leave due to the bridge," Swartzberg said. "We have vacancies we can't fill due to the bridge. It is just hard for businesses to make it when there is no traffic."
The traffic stopped on August 4, 2021 when the fire burned for hours, damaging the bridge and eventually rupturing a 40-inch gas line.
It took nearly three months for the bridge to be demolished and then six more months passed before the city signed a contract with C.W. Matthews Contracting to rebuild the bridge.
"I share the communities frustration with how long this has taken," Atlanta City Councilman Alex Wan said.
Wan believes the process for receiving and determining a winning bridge to have a contract signed took too long. The councilman was elected and took office during the middle of the process.
He became focused to make sure the contract was completed and took it into his own hands to carry it across the finish line.
"When I got into office I tried to get in and figure out how I could break the log jam. It was right in the middle of the procurement process," Wan said. "I was trying to check on it weekly and at the very end found out that all that was missing was one signature. I went down to city hall to dig it out of a bin to make sure the municipal clerk could certify it."
Construction is now expected to be completed by October 31.
In a statement, a spokesman with the Atlanta Department of Transportation said the project remains on schedule:
"The Notice to Proceed was issued to the contractor on April 27, 2022, and work began that day. Preliminary site investigations were completed before this date to keep the project on track. The contractor is completing the initial bridge design and construction at the site is currently underway. This project remains on schedule and will reopen to vehicular traffic, with a minimum of one lane in each direction, by October 31, 2022."
"The message is we are here, we survived, come see us. We would love to clean your car and have your business," said Matthew Bohannon, assistant manager of Soap Hand Car Wash along Cheshire Bridge Road.
He said the car wash just finished its worst July for sales in the last several years because of slow traffic.
He sums up the last year in one word: slow.
"Can't have any just drive-bys anymore, 'Oh, I'm going to get my car washed.' People actually have to know about us and come here," Bohannon said.
Wan said he is hopeful construction will be complete before October 31.
11Alive received a copy of the construction contract from the city showing the price tag for construction is $6,967,800.
The contractor, though, will be charged $1,000 per day for each day the project is late. There is also a $1,000 incentive for each day the project is completed early.