Railroad Construction Company, Inc., was recently awarded a $4 million contract by the Port Authority of NY & NJ for the complete replacement of track on the Hackensack River Bridge.  This double track vertical-lift bridge spans nearly 900’ between Kearny and Jersey City and links the Newark and Journal Square PATH stations.  In order to maintain rail traffic, work will be performed during weekend outages with one track being removed from service at a time.  Outages will take place from Friday evening to Monday morning with full service restored by Monday rush hour.  The track will be replaced in 100’ sections with work scheduled to begin in April 2015.

Prior to the start of work, safety netting will be installed which will completely encapsulate the open deck bridge.  Then the track structure and walkways will be removed and upgraded.

Included in the contract is the removal of the existing 140# running rails, guard rails, 150# contact rail and bridge timbers and the installation of new 115# rails, new 84C contact rail and new bridge timbers.  Because of the rail being changed from 140# to 115#, four new counterweight trays will be installed on the lift span to compensate for the reduced weight.  In addition, 67 damaged concrete ties will be removed and replaced and the ballasted track approaches will be resurfaced. 

The existing walkway grating and hand rail will be removed, repainted and re-installed.  While the timbers are removed and the bridge girders are exposed, the top flanges will be repainted.  All existing lead-based paint will be removed and disposed of according to OSHA standards and regulations.

We would like to thank Iggy Ortega, Joe Tobin, Ed Perara and John Wargo of the Port Authority of NY & NJ and all our subcontractors and suppliers for their assistance thus far.