by Jim Durkin, Juliette Astrup and Diana Henderson

THE first anniversary of Poole’s Twin Sails Bridge has been marred by yet another breakdown – just as the council takes on responsibility for its maintenance.

A year and a day after it first opened to traffic, a hydraulics problem left the bridge stuck in the cross sails position from Friday lunchtime until late in the evening.

It was finally re-opened at around 10.30pm.

Poole council expected the bridge to keep to a normal lifting schedule throughout the weekend, but with lifts taking three to three-and-a-half minutes instead of the normal two minutes.

The incident, the latest in a long line of bridge failures, occurred the same day Borough of Poole became responsible for repairing problems with the bridge.

Until now the contractor has born the responsibility, and the cost, of any faults with the bridge. While Hochtief (UK) Construction will continue to deal with outstanding and ongoing issues, any new maintenance and operational works arising will fall to the council.

The bridge became stuck just before 1pm, with drivers quickly reporting delays on both approaches. Motorist Peter McFarlane, who queued for 10 minutes before turning around, told the Daily Echo: “I haven’t seen anyone working on it. But it did move to the complete upright position a few minutes ago before coming back to this angle.”

Another driver said: “I’ve been here for 15 minutes and it doesn’t look like anything much is happening. It’s annoying.”

Cars queued both sides of the bridge approach until drivers were near enough to hear periodic tannoy announcements inviting them to seek alternative routes.

Highway maintenance workers eventually closed the bridge approach to traffic, installing temporary barriers, around 3pm.

The bridge remained closed throughout Friday’s rush hour and remains closed now.

Senior borough figures responsible for the bridge were unavailable to comment on the hydraulics problem.

However, speaking before the latest breakdown, council leader Cllr Elaine Atkinson said: “There have been some initial teething problems but that was to be expected with such an iconic, unique and complex structure.

“Despite these issues, less than two per cent of bridge lifts have been affected over the first 12 months and this figure has continued to improve in recent months.”

A Borough of Poole spokesman said: “The Twin Sails Bridge was temporarily closed to traffic from 12.56pm today due to a problem with the hydraulics system. Our maintenance team are working closely with the contractors to resolve the issue.”

The bridge, which is in the running for a regional RIBA architectural award, ran into a number of problems even before it opened, when the road surface began to crack and had to be replaced.

During its first six weeks of operation there were 15 occasions when it was closed to vehicles and disrupted marine traffic and work was carried out to replace valves which control all four barriers.

Winters gale force winds caused problems to the lifting leaves which went out of synchronisation and work has been carried out to shock absorbers, movement joints, minor hydraulic issues, cycle lane lines and adjustments to the control system.

However as time has gone on the problems have lessened. Between November last year and February 2013, bridge lifts were delayed eight times.