Private bridge closed for safety issues stranding five families
Dingman Township. A bridge on the property of Babette Smith has been declared an immediate danger to collapse and has been closed to vehicular and pedestrian traffic. Repair is estimated to cost $150,000.
Milford /
| 25 Aug 2021 | 10:43
This bridge, owned by Babette Smith in Dingman Township, has been ruled an immediate danger of collapse and was deemed unsafe to both vehicular and pedestrian traffic. It is estimated to cost $150,000 to repair. (
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A privately owned bridge that crosses the Sawkill Creek has been declared an immediate danger to collapse and has been closed to vehicle and pedestrian traffic, preventing the residents of five homes to access it.
Eugene Radanasky, an engineer wtih Construct Engineering in Milford found the bridge to be unsafe after an inspection, and according to Dingman Township Building Inspector Chris Wood, Rudanasky closed it
The bridge is owned by Babette Smith, who resides with her grandson in the first house to the right after crossing the bridge.
Smith did not respond to calls from The Courier by press time.
In a letter to Smith, Rudanasky wrote, “We have run some preliminary calculations on the shear strength of the web of the beam in the area where the majority of the web is missing, and we have found the bridge to be in immediate danger of collapse.”
Rudanasky did not return calls and emails from The Courier by press time.
The residents in the five homes across the bridge are now unable to drive across the bridge, so they park their cars on Sawkill Avenue and walk across the bridge to their homes located on the park side of the bridge.
“I freaked out Thursday night coming home to the closed bridge,” one of the residents, Susanne Geissler said in a Facebook message. “No way! We have to have until Monday to get supplies in.” They drove back and forth for a couple of days until they couldn’t anymore.
Geissler said she was forced to buy an additional vehicle to leave on the park side of the bridge. She parks on Sawkill Avenue, along with the other four families. Then walks across the bridge with her husband, who suffers from cancer. Then they go in the second vehicle to their home less than a half a mile away. Even though the engineer believes the bridge is not safe for pedestrian traffic, the people who live on the park side of the bridge have no access if they don’t walk across the bridge. Their only choice is to carry food, medical supplies and their many needs to their homes by walking with bags in push carts across the condemned bridge.
Rudanasky said in the letter to Smith, “We are happy to work with you to determine alternative temporary access to the homes in the interim period.”
Repairs to the bridge could begin in the spring of 2022.
The bridge’s GoFundMe page, put up by Babette Smith, https://www.gofundme.com/f/qhqq76-emergency-bridge-repair?utm_campaign=m_pd+share-sheet&utm_medium=copy_link_all&utm_source=customer , hasn’t received a donation in three months. It has raised $3,831 of the $150,000 estimated cost of the bridge.