A bid has been made to replace two South Cumbrian bridges.
Brigsteer and Underbarrow bridges, across the A591 near Kendal, were closed in 2024 as a precautionary measure due to structural concerns.
After detailed analysis, the bridges opened under a 7.5 tonne weight limit in February last year.
Westmorland and Furness Council has announced today that it was applying for Government funding to replace the bridges.
The council said it had made an initial outline expression to the Government’s Structures Fund.
A final submission has to be made by August 3, with an announcement on funding awards expected in the autumn. In the meantime, work is ongoing to make the temporary restrictions on bridges permanent
Councillor Peter Thornton, cabinet member for highways and ICT, said: “We have high hopes that the Government will look favourably on our bid to the Structures Fund but even if successful, there will be much work to do to fully assess and design the best solution for those replacement bridges before construction could start.
“For this reason, we need to make the restrictions on the current bridges permanent. We have monitored the temporary restrictions and made changes to ensure disruption is kept to a minimum.”
The authority added that there was no guarantee that the bid would be successful, and if it was, design work alone could take more than 12 months.
Urgent action was recently taken to protect the bridges from the risk of damage or even collapse after repeated breaches of weight restrictions and the process to make the temporary restrictions permanent is under way.
The results of recent camera monitoring showed multiple breaches of the 7.5 tonne weight restriction, which was put in place after the bridges were classified as weak structures.
HGVs typically weighing up to 40 tonnes have been observed making return journeys over the bridges.
Over 13 days of monitoring, nearly 30 weight restriction breaches were identified.
A 6’6” width restriction was put in through temporary traffic management to prevent larger vehicles using the bridges were put in place, as well as a 20mph speed limit.
The temporary arrangements are being monitored and work is now ongoing on the design of the permanent highway remodelling for the width restriction.
The council said the permanent restrictions would hopefully be in place by September. They would mostly bethe same as the current arrangement, but with high kerbs rather than bollards. The existing weight limit and temporary width limit signs will be combined into new signs.
The design and installation of the permanent traffic management and signs forming the width restriction will be subject to an independent safety review to ensure it will meet appropriate standards.
Brigsteer and Underbarrow bridges are reinforced concrete half joint structures erected in the 1970s.
They are now classified as weak structures.
