In our community, there is confusion concerning the demolition date of the Skinners Falls Bridge.  One source said it could be as early as this week, possibly Thursday if not sooner.  PennDOT,  which claims to know everything about the bridge, including its disputable claims that it is not restorable, somehow suddenly seems to know nothing.

The public wants to know and should know. The confusion, concern and anxiety in our community is a result of PennDOT’s lack of transparency, because certainly this powerful agency must have a plan that at this point would include a pretty damn good idea about when the bridge will be blown into oblivion. 

Surely it is incumbent upon PennDOT to give residents and the community advance notice and keep us fully informed about the progress of the disruptive construction for destruction.  

One would think that any agency with the power to spend taxpayer money—$4 million on feasibility studies and another $8 million and counting dedicated to the destruction of the bridge—would know very well what date it will be demolished.  

The demolition of the bridge as planned is violent—dropping the New York side onto the causeway and exploding the Pennsylvania side into the river. Many here and elsewhere consider the unnecessary eradication of the Skinners Falls Bridge a violation of our community and history, and the apotheosis of PennDOT’s neglect of the bridge and failure to respond to the community’s longtime pleas for its maintenance and subsequent preservation.

It will be a horror to see and hear our beloved bridge trashed and smashed.

PennDOT will be held accountable for this catastrophic loss. Experts not in the employ of PennDOT claim the bridge was not a danger and is restorable.  

When and how will PennDOT provide clarification about the demolition date? The rumors in our community are because PennDOT is holding what should be public information closer than cards in a rigged game of poker, a game that PennDOT has been playing with the public all along.

Cynthia Nash
Milanville, PA