Roads need to be strengthened and bends widened so that materials for Iceland’s first wind farm at Vaðalda can be transported. The works are being carried out at the expense of Landsvirkjun (National Power Company of Iceland).
Work is under way to widen and strengthen roads due to the transport of materials for wind turbines for Vaðaldavirkjun (Vaðalda wind farm). In some places, signs and lampposts need to be removed so that the transport vehicles can pass.
The largest heavy transport operation ever undertaken in Iceland will begin next month when Landsvirkjun transports wind turbines from Þorlákshöfn to Vaðalda, where Iceland’s first wind farm will be built. Work is under way to widen and strengthen roads so that the transport vehicles can pass.
Svanur Bjarnason, engineer at Vegagerðin (Icelandic Road and Coastal Administration), explains what is happening.
Contractors on behalf of Landsvirkjun are widening, first of all, a junction so that these long vehicles, which will pass through to transport these wind turbine components, can get through the junction, and work is also under way to strengthen and widen a kilometre-long section of Votmúlavegur.
In the image below, you can see the transport route and where roads need to be widened; at Nesbraut and Laxabraut in Þorlákshöfn, Suðurstrandavegur, Þorlákshafnarvegur, at the junction of Þorlákshafnarvegur and Eyrarbakkavegur, at Votmúlavegur and Gaulverjabæjarvegur, the roundabout at Suðurlandsvegur and Landvegamót. Work is also under way to improve a large section of Landvegur and to construct a bridge at Helliskvísl.
At one junction there are both lampposts and signs that need to be removed, and these signs will be mounted on so-called quick-release fixtures so that they can simply be taken down in the evening, and then once the transport has passed they can be put back up again, and then taken down again the next evening. The lampposts will simply be reinstalled at the end of the summer.
The transport operations will take around nine weeks and there will be close to four hundred trips in total. Each convoy can be up to 250 metres long.
This is only half of the wind turbines that are being transported now, and a similar number is planned for next spring,… It will also likely be necessary to maintain these wind turbines in the future, and it must be possible to move these long components around, so it is expected that this will remain in place.
Source: Ruv.is
