BROOKLYN TOWNSHIP, Pa. -- It’s been two months since flood waters ripped apart a bridge over Hot Bottom Creek in Brooklyn Township near Montrose. People who live nearby will have to wait another year for a complete fix from PennDOT.
Even though the road is closed, drivers still cause quite the headache for Rodney and Nancy Oakley.
“Well, it's very annoying when they turn around in my yard. I try to keep my place up in shape and they're turning around in my yard and rutting it up,” Rodney said.
People who live nearby said the creek floods pretty often, but they've never seen flood waters carry so much debris and logs from the nearby lumber yard into the bridge.
“Nothing like this. Never! My wife has lived here all her life, and this is the worst she's ever seen it,” Rodney said.
The bridge is a main thoroughfare for a lot of people in the area and work isn’t scheduled to start until mid-March.
“It just makes it a little inconvenient for us to get to Kinglsey to the restaurant, our access to (Interstate) 81,” Nancy said.
The inconvenience is huge for lumber drivers at nearby Diaz Forest Products.
“It adds about 15, 20 minutes on a trip especially when you're loaded because you're just creeping up those hills. Can't go fast up or down,” driver Mike Ellen said.
Diaz has another location just up the hill. Worked used to drive over the bridge to get there, but now they can’t.
“This has been sitting here for months and it puts a hurting on us,” Ellen said.
The bridge is scheduled to reopen next summer. Work is expected to start in mid-March.