A half of the Iddo Bridge in Lagos State will be demolished next week in preparation for rebuilding.

The Regional Manager of Julius Berger Nigeria, Mr Thomas Christl, announced this yesterday during an inspection tour of the bridge by the Minister of Works, Dave Umahi.

“Three spans of the existing Iddo Bridge are heavily damaged and need to be replaced.

“What we are doing at the moment is that we are separating the two lanes – the two directions – and next week, we will shift the traffic on one direction and one half of the bridge will be demolished and rebuilt.

“When this is done, by end of March, most likely, we will shift the traffic on the new side of the bridge and demolish this side of the bridge and rebuild this bridge,” the manager said. He said the company was also constructing the bridge’s underpass.

He added: “We have already started with the drainage works, the outfall to the lagoon is already done.

“After the drainage works, we will remove the soil and lower the road level so that we have a higher clearance for the bridge so that no trucks can crash into the bridge anymore which was a main reason for the damages on the existing one.”