First traffic jams caused by works on A7; Bridge closed for five months

There was a lot of traffic on the road early on Monday morning due to work on the bridge on the A7 near Purmerend. The ANWB reported a 25-minute delay on the N247 from Volendam to Amsterdam around 6:30 a.m. That road is approximately parallel to the A7 towards the south of the province of Noord-Holland.

On Monday, Rijkswaterstaat started strengthening the bridge on the A7 over the Noordhollandsch Kanaal near Purmerend. The work will take five months, and road users have been warned to expect significant traffic disruptions in the form of narrowed lanes, a lower speed limit, and closed entrances and exits. The extra travel time can be up to an hour.

Rijkswaterstaat urged road users to carpool, detour, take public transport, or work from home in the next five months. To encourage public transport use, Rijkswaterstaat will make free NS discount cards available. NS will sometimes run longer trains during the months that work is done on the bridge. Regional carrier MeerPlus adjusted its timetable during the week, giving more buses time to drive the route during the morning rush hour.

To prevent cut-through traffic, several roads in the region are closed to through traffic during the morning and evening rush hours. Residents of the region receive an exemption for this. The province of Noord-Holland also closed two parallel roads between Oosthuizen and Edan and between Oudendijk and Oosthuizen to prevent people from taking the parallel roads, which are often used by cyclists and local traffic, during traffic jams on the provincial highway. Road inspectors and motorcycle traffic controllers are deployed in the area to ensure that things run smoothly.

The Dijklander Hospital, which has branches in Purmerend and Hoorn, is concerned about the consequences of the work for the accessibility of the hospital. Ambulances often use the bridge to get from one location to the other. The hospital fears that, due to the expected traffic, there may be no free lanes for emergency services.