An engineer working on the Adentan-Madina footbridge has said that concerns being raised about the recently constructed footbridge are much ado about nothing.

“I really do not see why people are having difficulty using it,” Enoch Anyimadu of First Sky Limited said on the Joy FM’s Super Morning Show, Wednesday.

In a Joy News feature on Tuesday, some residents of Adentan, a suburb of Accra, complained about the unfriendly nature of the bridge, claiming it takes a lot of time and effort to access it.  

“From the downside, it is 150 meters long and then it goes zigzag, which is very long. In fact, a certain woman who was carrying a sack of maize said it was difficult to excessing the bridge while carrying goods,” JoyNews’ Nancy Amefa Dradosi reported.

But explaining the situation, the Project Engineer,  who worked on one of the bridges, said the footpath is deliberately made long to make it disability friendly.

According to him if the distance in accessing the bridge was short, it would have made the slope too steep for disabled persons in wheelchairs or using walking sticks to access it.

He added that there are resting points at every ten-meter interval of the bridge to help people rest while using the bridge.  

Violent protests

The death of a female student on the Madina-Adentan Highway by a speeding vehicle on  November 2018 stirred violent demonstrations by Adenta residents, moving the government to start the construction of the six footbridges.

A taxi driver rammed into the teenager, a first-year student of the West Africa Senior High School (WASS), after she had left the campus.

She died on the spot and the driver reported himself to the police.

The accident which triggered fresh outrage saw angry residents set tyres ablaze with billows of smoke clutching the atmosphere.

“No more deaths!” the residents chanted following the accident which occurred at about 4 pm Thursday.

Sensitisation

The Engineer is troubled that people are not using the bridge after all the investment that has been devoted to it.

He wants the government to begin a sensitisation programme to encourage people to use it.