Historic LV Bridge Gets Repairs After Crash

If you’ve driven over the stone bridge at the southern end of Schooley’s Mountain Road recently, you may have noticed a change of scenery: Morris County-labeled barricades in place of a 10-foot section of missing stone and mortar.

According to , an elderly woman drove into the wall earlier this month, knocking out the section of the bridge, pushing stones down into the South Branch of the Raritan River.

Connolly Construction, contracted by Morris County Engineering, is making repairs on the bridge. The county said it would take approximately one week to repair the section. Repair work began on Monday, Dec. 12.

The bridge, constructed in 1870, is under Washington Township’s Historic Preservation Commission’s guidelines, however, and changes or restoration are usually subject to approval by the commission.

But because the company is restoring the bridge with the stone that fell from it, rather than bringing in new pieces, the color match will be ensured and won’t look like it was patched, according to the preservation commission’s president, Eileen Stokes.

None of fixes to the bridge need to be approved, Stokes said, and the county has notified the preservation commission that there will be an exact replacement. The county is also using the same contractor (Connolly) that completed previous restoration work on the bridge, and is familiar with the structure.

The project is expected to be done by Friday, Dec. 16.