There's a connection between the delays on the 102 Avenue bridge and the controversial new suicide barriers on the High Level Bridge.

The common denominator is city planning.

Or perhaps that should be the lack of city planning.

The city announced Thursday that the long-delayed reconstruction of the 102 Avenue bridge is largely complete and the bridge will finally (mostly) reopen to traffic by the evening rush hour on Friday. Hallelujah!

Clogged traffic Sure.

The delay, which has clogged traffic between the west end and downtown for an extra year and hurt businesses near the bridge, was not entirely the city's fault. Maybe.

The girder subcontractor, Edmonton's Supreme Steel, "misinterpreted" the installation instructions for the six massive girders that support the roadbed over the bridge. So while the beams were being installed a year ago March, three of them bent.

But Supreme has done several massive metal projects in the past much larger than the 102 Avenue bridge, without similar incidents.

That begs the question:

Who wrote the specifications?

City engineers?

It may take years of investigations and lawsuits to sort out the blame.

But here are a couple of thoughts.

Every one of the city's last five bridge projects - including the Quesnell bridge, the Walterdale replacement and the Capilano - has been delayed or over budget, or both.

Meanwhile the new downtown arena, Rogers Place, is a very much more complicated project than any bridge but it is on time.

The difference? Rather than the city engineering department being in charge of the arena's construction, the Oilers Entertainment Group is responsible.

The OEG are undoubtedly much sterner taskmasters because, unlike the city, their own money is on the line - maybe not so much in the construction, but in the possibility of financial losses if Rogers' opening were delayed. Let's face it, the city's ability to plan and execute big

projects has to be called into question. Just look at the mess the Metro LRT line is still in more than two years after construction was completed. Which brings us to the suicide barriers on the High Level Bridge.

It's sweet that city councillors are now admitting they acted hastily in approving the construction of a cheap alternative that has now made the busiest bike lane in town (one of the few truly busy ones) inconvenient at best and dangerous at worst.

But had council given their heads a shake during discussion of the new fences to prevent suicide attempts, they would have known the barriers would narrow still further the shared pedestrian-bicycle pathways on either side of the High Level.

'Moral pressure'

Councillor Scott McKeen pleads that council was under "moral pressure" to save lives by erecting the anti-jumping fences quickly.

Funny, though, that council never seems to feel under any "fiscal pressure" to think through its decisions. That's what comes from dreaming with other people's money.

Some of the blame may not be council's. Councillors insist they were told the pillars for the new fence would only infringe on the bike/walking path by 129 mm wide. The actual pillars are more than twice that wide (295 mm).

But councillors must either be accountable or must hold city administrators to account.

Don't expect them to do either.

Now bicycle commuters are asking for a solution to the potentially disastrous situation on the bridge. And undoubtedly our pressure prone council will give them one, such as a new park along the top of the bridge or new, wider paths to replace the existing ones.

Either way, the pain will be felt by Edmonton's hard pressed taxpayers, not by council or city planners, which is why so much city planning goes bad.