The precis version: we started rebuilding our bridge. The flood happened. We finished the bridge.
When we bought our property in Kauai, we knew there were a couple really "big ticket" items that were going to require additional $$$$: one of those items was this 70' bridge by which we and our immediate neighbor access our property. Quite simply, the wood of the bridge was significantly rotted and needed to be replaced ASAP. "ASAP" ended up being about a year after we closed escrow.
General Timeline: we ordered all the wood beams in December 2017 from a company in Washington. Approximately 3 months to prepare wood and ship. Wood arrived in Honolulu the end of March, and arrived Nawiliwili Port in Kauai the first week of April 2018. Transport from the port to the Princeville side of the Hanalei Bridge was a pretty straightforward hauling of the entirety of the wood via Semi-truck.
From the Hanalei Bridge to our property was a much trickier venture. From that point there are severe weight limitations on the road and over the 7 single lane bridges. From the Hanalei Bridge, the wood was carried 2-3 beams at a time by pick-up-trucks with trailers, like 15 roundtrips for the 45 beams. All wood arrived at our property by April 6. Work on our bridge commenced April 9. The general plan was to replace 1/3 of the bridge each week, along with painting of steel I-beams below wood.
(all construction pics courtesy of my neighbor)
Old beams off, placing new beams...
Painting steel I-beams to protect from rust corrosion...
Temporarily bolting down before weekend construction break. (permanent bolting happens when curb beam installed).
And this is what Saturday April 14 looked like. The beginning of the 24-hour period that saw 48" of rain fall. The Big Flood. So many things to be grateful about. Our wood wasn't still stuck on the other side of the Hanalei Bridge - with no way now to be transported, as the entire North Shore Highway is shut down with landslides and portions of the highway eroded away. The bridge beams were bolted down and didn't wash away. The other beams and wearing-surface planks were not damaged or lost. Both our (ours and our neighbors') homes were fine, undamaged by the rising waters.
The pics from here on out are my own. Here's the old rotted bridge wood, stacked in our front yard. Notice the abundant plant life!! oy. This is now mid May. Time to get busy. Lots of clean-up...
Also in the grateful column, our contractor is a North Shore resident who still had access to our neighborhood despite the limited access highway. Since our driveway was blown out and driving access to our properties was cut off, the new bridge plan became to tear out and replace the last 2/3 beams at one go. Work re-commenced mid-May.
This section of the river is actually a "tail-race" whose flow can be controlled by the powerplant up the road. Here it's considerably shut down. Which was super helpful in terms of accessing the bottom portion of our beams for painting.
This is "the plank" (about 40') we needed to walk over with all our luggage and groceries and various Home Depot project pieces for a few days before all the beams were laid. That was a whole lot of fun?
New wood (foreground), old wood (background).
Re-using bolts and screws ...
Not re-using (for the bridge, anyways) old rotted wood.
Two enginerds discussing spacing details. And hey! A sunny day!! Finally!!!
River flowing again, making ladder work trickier.
No more plank to walk. Yay!
Planks for wearing-surface.
And that was the bridge status on the day we left. Our construction crew were rockstars!!
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