Bridge Work Starts at Last
The Sagg Bridge will get the rehabilitation it so desperately needs starting later this month. Sagaponack Village officials announced Monday that the Bridge Lane structure will be closed to all vehicular and pedestrian traffic on Nov. 14 at 7 a.m. for the extensive repairs. It will reopen by May 15 at the latest.
The nearly $1.2 million project has been a long time coming, following a lengthy battle to protect the area’s rural character that ended last year with Southampton Town selling the bridge to the village for $1. The work is being funded by $500,000 in state grant money that Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. and Senator Kenneth J. LaValle secured this summer along with money the village is taking out of a capital reserve fund.
Improvements to the small country bridge, which was built in 1923 and crosses Sagg Pond, connecting Bridgehampton to Sagaponack, will include updating drainage along the approaching road and repairs to the causeway and seawall. The bridge will have a new deck, curbing, and sidewalks, and its railing will be fixed.
The town had wanted to use federal money to repair and widen the 91-foot-long, 24.5-foot-wide bridge, but Sagaponack officials intervened.
Village officials had discussed doing the work in two phases, but after engineering reports were finalized and the money from the state came through, it was decided that doing all the work at once was best, according to Rhodi Winchell, the village clerk-treasurer.
While the bridge is closed, drivers will be detoured to Sagaponack Road or Montauk Highway. The boat ramp at the bridge will also be closed during the work, and boaters and duck hunters looking to get out on Sagg Pond will have to do so from Sagg Main Beach.
The village board awarded the contract for the work to Keith Grimes Inc. at its Oct. 11 meeting, Ms. Winchell said.