by Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services

NNSL (Jan 31/97) - Certain combinations of words provoke acute skepticism as surely as a doctor's rubber hammer provokes a knee-jerk.

"Wanna buy a bridge?" is one of those combinations.

That's close to the question the territorial government asked in a tender published late last year.

The bridge was the 40-year-old Yellowknife River bridge. The government wasn't so naive as to think someone would pay for it. The bridge was initially offered to anyone who would take it away.

It was offered, explained Jivko Jivkov, head of structures for the Department of Transportation, to "anyone from the industry or any other interested party that would have any interest whatsoever."

Maybe that was one too many "any"s. Not one bite.

The GNWT discovered the reason for the resounding silence when it did a study on disposal of the bridge before preparing a revised tender.

"To reuse this structure it had to be moved," said Jivkov. "To be moved it had to be disassembled. And once you disassembled this structure you have to reassemble it again, you come into the very heavy environmental issue of sandblasting the lead paint, which is considered highly contaminant.

"Disposing of this paint is more expensive than taking it off the bridge. Then you would have to reinforce the bridge and reassemble it again.

"Altogether it amounts to being more expensive than building a new bridge."

With the new information, came a new tendering proposal, the basic thrust being, "Okay, we'll pay you to take it!"

Bernie's Ltd., a Yellowknife pile driving contractor, accepted the new improved offer, taking it off the GNWT's hands for a mere $21,000.

They cut the bridge apart, stripped and properly disposed of the lead paint, and shipped the works south to a smelter.

So next time you shave with razor blades, open a tin of tuna or a can of catfood, think of the old Yellowknife River bridge.