A Portland contractor, Scott Construction Corporation, will begin work shortly beneath the Route 1 bridge spanning Nequasset Brook in Woolwich.

The project will be getting underway after Labor Day. The work involves shoring up the four piers supporting the bridge that carries thousands of motorists across it every day.

Greg Scott, president and project manager of Scott Construction Corporation, told the Wiscasset Newspaper on Friday that a good deal of the work will be carried out underwater by a team of specially trained divers.

In accordance with MDOT specifications, the job involves reinforcing the steel pilings supporting the piers. There are seven pilings to each pier assembly, 28 in all. Fourteen piers are beneath the north and south embankments, and 14 are in the brook.

“It’s a typical enhancement, repair,” Scott said. As he explained, each of the pilings will be reinforced with steel rebar and surrounded by a “stay-in-place” fiberglass form that will then be filled with concrete. Piling in the brook will be sleeved just above the high-water mark.

A three-member diving team will do the underwater work supported by a four-member land crew. Tools, materials and whatever else is needed will be ferried back and forth in a small boat. Scott said two floats to work from would be tied to the piers. The concrete needed will come from a cement truck parked on the road shoulder.

The bridge will remain open to traffic throughout the construction. “We’ll maintain two lanes of traffic, but have a temporary lane shift in place to allow more room to work from on the shoulder,” added Scott.

MDOT’s contract calls for making a temporary bicycle route around the bridge. North bound bicyclists will be directed on to Nequasset Road past the municipal building and then left onto George Wright Road, which carries them back to Route 1. Southbound bikers will follow the same route in reverse.

Weather permitting, the project will take four to six weeks and be completed by early October.   

The Nequasset Bridge is the last of three MDOT bridges Scott Construction Corporation is repairing this summer. The others, part of the same $453,570 bid package, were in in the towns of Litchfield/West Gardiner, and Manchester. The work on those bridges also involved shoring up pilings. Scott estimated the cost of the repairs to the Nequasset Bridge would be between $140,000 and $150,000.

The Woolwich Board of Selectmen is allowing Scott Construction Corporation to use the town’s boat launch during the work, but not the parking area for storing materials needed for the repairs. In response, Scott said he’s arranged to store materials in a vacant lot across from the Woolwich town office.