ALBANY COUNTY — On Friday afternoon, traffic is expected to flow in both directions on Route 85 in Slingerlands after having been closed for a failed bridge-replacement project.

The new pedestrian bridge that buckled on July 12, and was removed in pieces on July 28, was meant to replace a century-old railroad bridge — part of the Albany County Helderberg-Hudson Rail Trail.

“With the drainage issues fixed, the new sidewalk installed, and paving now complete, construction work on State Route 85 in Slingerlands is coming to a close,” said a Thursday press release from the Albany County Executive’s Office. “While it is weather-dependent, final striping of the roadway is scheduled for tomorrow morning.”

Rail-trail walkers and cyclists are to continue to use a detour until an interim bridge is installed.

Construction on an interim steel truss bridge is to start on Oct. 2, the county said, and is scheduled to open on Oct. 31.

There will be a temporary lane closing on Route 85 once railing is delivered so it can be installed, the release said.

In 2019, the county decided on a $1.9 million plan to remove the 42-foot wide existing railroad bridge and replace it with a two-girder structure that would be 14 feet wide, raising the structure to 15 feet, 6 inches above the roadway to meet state requirements.

Construction on the new bridge was to start in the summer of 2020 but was delayed by both the pandemic and litigation. The cost about doubled from the original $1.9 million because of legal challenges and having to relocate buried cable.

Albany County had acquired the bridge in 2009, as part of its purchase of the nine-mile stretch of railway that runs between the Port of Albany and Voorheesville.

Built in 1912, the bridge had been in rough shape for some time. In 2019, the county said the bridge had been struck by vehicles passing beneath it nine times in the past 11 years. And it was struck several more times since.

A 2008 report said that the bridge’s structural steel and much of its concrete were in “very poor condition.” And a 2017 inspection by the New York State Department of Transportation said that the structure was in such bad shape, its deficiencies could “significantly impact” the bridge’s “load carrying capacity.”

The railroad bridge was removed before the intended replacement bridge was installed in late June, but the new, pedestrian bridge collapsed as concrete decking was being installed; no one was hurt.