Drivers should add a few extra minutes to their morning commute for a detour if they are traveling on Alabama 99 in the Athens area.

The bridge over Round Island Creek west of Athens will be closed today and remain closed for 2 to 3 months.

“Detours will be on county roads 48 and 43,” said Johnnie Harris, Division 1 Engineer for The Department of Transportation.

If one were traveling north on Alabama 99 they would turn on County Road 48, then onto County Road 43 to get back onto 99.

Burgreen (Keenum) Construction, based in Athens, won the bid for the project from the Department of Transportation at approximately $220,000.

“The contractor is going to start his replacement of the existing structure with a culvert,” said Harris. “We’ll be taking the traffic off of that section until we can replace and pave back over it.”

The project will consist of the destruction and removal of the old bridge, building the culvert and then repaving the portion of road.

According to Harris, it will be a double-barrel culvert to allow water to pass through in Round Island Creek.