Construction work to replace a bridge in Trout Creek, south of North Bay, is leaving people in the area frustrated.

Originally set to be finished at the end of this month, there have been a number of delays. 

Now, people are worried about emergency response times.

Crews and diggers have been working on the Highway 522 bridge in Trout Creek throughout the summer.

"There's been a lot of setbacks and a lot of things that were unexpected." said Ted Weiler, deputy mayor of Powassan.

Those setbacks include a break in formwork, when concrete was being poured. Since then, new concrete was poured two weeks ago.

Now the installation of steel girders, the forming of the deck, paving and line painting, among other parts of the project are underway.

All of this still needs to be completed before the bridge can re-open.

"We had two delays caused by gas line rupture. The construction company hit gas lines, and every time that happened they were delayed again." said Weiler.

His main concern surrounds emergency response. Until the bridge is finished, there's no way to get to the southern parts of town, unless you take a take a 20 minute detour on Highway 11.

"We've got a fire department just up the road from us and the nearest house to the fire department is 500 meters away, and we're 15-20 minutes from getting there if that house is on fire." said Weiler.

The town's general store owned by Yousuf Tariq is located beside the bridge and business hasn't been booming since construction crews arrived.

"We depend on the cottagers who come from south. Nobody has showed up because they're totally confused on how to go on 522. We lost a lot of revenue for a small business in this town." said Tariq.

He says he was evacuated when the gas lines were ruptured.

"The store has been shut down three times in peak summer. Quite a number of people were scared in town and something worse could have happened, but lucky we were okay." said Tariq.

The Ministry of Transportation of Ontario pledges to work with the contractor to accelerate construction and will continue to monitor the bridge's replacement.

The bridge is set to be open again in late November.