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MEANS OF COMMUNICATION. Sítámpeta pass through the Pálkonda Agency into the same district. In two directions improvements might be effected to these roads; namely, by providing them with avenues, which are not plentiful at present, and by bridging some more of the many rivers and torrents which pour down from the hills across the line of all the main routes and sometimes greatly delay traffic.

The district no doubt already contains several fine bridges. The more important are those on the trunk road over the Sárada river near Anakápalle (ten arches of 30 feet span), over the Mahéndragedda (six arches of the same size) and over the Góstani at Chittivalasa (eleven similar arches); on the Vizagapatam-Bimlipatam road, that across the Gudilóvagedda (three arches of 40 feet span, built in 1883-84 at an outlay of Rs. 30,000); on the Srungavarapukóta-Bhimasingi road, that over the Mogadárigedda (four cut-stone arches of 30 feet span) and on the Púdimadaka-Mádgole road, that over the Sárada river (five girders of 60 feet each, built in 1901 at a cost of Rs. 72,000).

In 1887 a pontoon bridge was completed across the backwater at Vizagapatam, at the joint cost of the district board and the municipality, to facilitate communication with Anakápalle and the south. It consisted of 21 girders 20 feet long supported on steel pontoons 80 feet long, with a 40 feet opening in the centre for navigation, and was made by Messrs. Burn & Co. of Calcutta at a cost of Rs. 90,000. Up to 1894 it was in charge of the municipality, and afterwards of the district board. It was a failure. The salt-water so rapidly corroded the pontoons, in spite of every effort to protect them with paint, that by 1901 they were in places no thicker than stout paper, and notwithstanding constant and expensive repairs they began bursting one after the other. The idea of building a masonry bridge was mooted, but was given up in consequence of the great cost involved and the uncertainty regarding the requirements of the proposed harbour (see p. 327) in the backwater. Eventually in 1904 a ferry flat, purchased at a cost of Rs. 9,500 and worked by a submerged chain, replaced the pontoon bridge. This is hardly capable of coping with the present traffic southwards, even though the latter has greatly diminished since the railway was built. Under- vent road-dams (which are cheaper than bridges, are less liable to be carried away by floods, and serve all purposes except during heavy freshes) are now being constructed across the Champávati at Gajapatinagaram and the Végavati on the road from Rámabhadrapuram to Párvatípur above mentioned. 135