The Winamac Town Park’s “swinging bridge” may soon get a new paint job. The town’s park board got the results of the recent bridge inspection during Thursday’s meeting. Looking through the inspection report, board members noted that it only found a few minor issues with the 96-year-old bridge.
One thing that Pat Bawcum pointed out was that the bridge will have to be sandblasted and painted within the next four to eight years. “I think it might behoove us to pick one of those years and start saving money back, so it’s not a big cost that happens,” she said, “that we could move it each year and have that as the painting fund, because that’s probably going to be a pretty salty endeavor, because there’s some lead that has to be taken off, and that’s going to have to be abated. So I think, in today’s cost, get at least a ballpark figure of what it would cost to do all that.”
Board Member Brad Zellers said the work would likely focus on the bridge’s two towers. “I don’t think everything in between has much paint on it, as far as the cables,” he noted, “but the towers, it’s obviously falling off those.”
At this point, the park board is aiming to have the work done by 2023 for the bridge’s centennial. Residents have proposed holding a celebration and adding a decorative lighting feature.
