Eastern path to Mandur’s ‘bridge to nowhere’ still sinking

Panaji: In another twist to Dongorim’s bridge-to-nowhere problem, the short approach road on its eastern side on Carambolim khazan land has started sinking, raising safety concerns and issues about wastage of public funds.
The old bridge over a rivulet at Dongorim had collapsed and the work on a new one had commenced after 2008. The new link was built by 2012 to help farmers cross and take agricultural machinery from the western side to their fields at Carambolim.
The approach road from Dongorim on the western side appears to be safe and motorable.“But the short approach road on the eastern side, which is only a platform or a landing point, is sinking just seven months after the work was completed,” said Ramrao Wagh of AAP.
“It is dangerous for locals on their walking rounds and fishermen going for fishing if it (the vulnerable barricaded section) collapses,” Prashant Naik, Azossim-Mandur sarpanch said.
Vertically, the approach has gone down by about 10 inches and horizontally the gap is around 2 inches — good enough for a plastic bottle to pass through, Wagh said. The bridge was built during the tenure of the then St Andre MLA, Francis Silveira, who was also Goa State Infrastructure Development Corporation (GSIDC) chairman at that time.
The bridge got its nomenclature as it had no approach road for nearly a decade.
GSIDC, which raised this infrastructure for farmers, fell short of funds to lay approach roads on both sides, sources said.
By then, farming had come to a halt in the degraded khazan land due to the overgrowth of mangroves in extensive stretches and the submergence of other areas due to broken bundhs. But GSIDC still went ahead with the work for the approach roads about five years ago at a cost of around Rs 4 crore. Due to the almost impenetrable nature of mangroves on the eastern side, the corporation built only a platform of about 30sqm with a parapet wall as an extension of the bridge.
St Andre MLA Viresh Borkar criticised the waste of public funds. “Why is it not being inaugurated? The CM should take note of this matter,” he told reporters. “GSIDC should consider using the bridge for tourism or birding and set up a watch tower,” Wagh said.
Panaji: In another twist to Dongorim’s bridge-to-nowhere problem, the short approach road on its eastern side on Carambolim khazan land has started sinking, raising safety concerns and issues about wastage of public funds.
The old bridge over a rivulet at Dongorim had collapsed and the work on a new one had commenced after 2008. The new link was built by 2012 to help farmers cross and take agricultural machinery from the western side to their fields at Carambolim.
The approach road from Dongorim on the western side appears to be safe and motorable. “But the short approach road on the eastern side, which is only a platform or a landing point, is sinking just seven months after the work was completed,” said Ramrao Wagh of AAP.
“It is dangerous for locals on their walking rounds and fishermen going for fishing if it (the vulnerable barricaded section) collapses,” Prashant Naik, Azossim-Mandur sarpanch said.
Vertically, the approach has gone down by about 10 inches and horizontally the gap is around 2 inches — good enough for a plastic bottle to pass through, Wagh said. The bridge was built during the tenure of the then St Andre MLA, Francis Silveira, who was also Goa State Infrastructure Development Corporation (GSIDC) chairman at that time.
The bridge got its nomenclature as it had no approach road for nearly a decade.
GSIDC, which raised this infrastructure for farmers, fell short of funds to lay approach roads on both sides, sources said.
By then, farming had come to a halt in the degraded khazan land due to the overgrowth of mangroves in extensive stretches and the submergence of other areas due to broken bundhs. But GSIDC still went ahead with the work for the approach roads about five years ago at a cost of around Rs 4 crore. Due to the almost impenetrable nature of mangroves on the eastern side, the corporation built only a platform of about 30sqm with a parapet wall as an extension of the bridge.
St Andre MLA Viresh Borkar criticised the waste of public funds. “Why is it not being inaugurated? The CM should take note of this matter,” he told reporters. “GSIDC should consider using the bridge for tourism or birding and set up a watch tower,” Wagh said.