This is one unbelievable story. Children falling inside buses, bridge sections falling onto trains, and other cars. Some landing in the nations biggest river (just below a dam). Rush hour in the states largest city, and one of the busiest bridges.
Its all sad, with that said, are bridges designed to have steel sections, and other components replaced? Or are most designs just meant to be torn down and completely replaced from the ground up? It seems like this one was a mostly steel bridge, and likely failed in a brittle manner. Is it going to be possible to maintain all these bridges, without complete replacement? I think this one will likely bring the issue to the forefront (at least until the election is over).
I find it interesting that many in our world have a culture of throw-it-away, I want new and shiny, if its old and dirty, it must therefore be bad.
In my mind, this is real design. Keeping my rear-end off the floor of my living room is lightweight design in comparison.
I guess the short answer is that....
..if Dick Cheney had been a former CEO of a "bridge building multinational" instead of Halliburton Energy Services...the priorities of the different levels of U.S. gouvernment would be different from what they are now. I do not know if priorities is what keeps a bridge in good condition, but it is sad that a number of people can't even ask that question anymore...
As posted recently, elsewhere:
The Minneapolis calamity will spawn a wave of concern about America's stock of public structures. There are said to be 500,000 bridges over twenty feet in length in America, with an average age of. . .40 years.
It has been estimated that $1.4 B would need to be spent every year for twenty years, to properly ugrade/repair them.
Cracks in this bridge were noted fifteen years ago; more recently the state was given the option to a) repair them, or b) step up the inspection schedule. It chose the latter. "Distorted" steel members were also noted (those would presumably be ones normally in compression ?).
An amusing/exasperating note: one of the earliest observations made by some media writers was that this bridge was "unusual" for having no piers in the water. There are always bogus red herrings (is that redundant), it seems, in lay reports of technical issues ! Where are the senior editors ?
one man's junk is another man's junk
As far as our disposable culture, I think it's remarkable too; newness has really become an obsession. When I look around and see all the new cars on the road, mostly homogenous in their design, I think to myself, will people ever really do ground-up restorations on 2007 Nissan trucks forty years from now like they do on 1955 Ford F150s? Will people be restoring the plywood palaces that pass for homes one day like they do old Craftsmans from 75-100 years ago? Sourcing period particle board and Chinese imported fittings? Somehow, I don't think so, but that's just my feeling.
Are things just not made to last anymore because there is no longer a market for it? What happened? This question is not a rhetorical one. It haunts me.
Well, that is
a slightly different question (consumer goods vs public infrastructure) but still an interesting one.
The real issue with the existing stock of bridges, highways, railway lines, tunnels, dams, etc is that if we don't maintain them we'll have to build them from scratch, sometimes on a surprise schedule, following casualties -- a triply unnecessary and preventable expense.
Coastal flooding really plays havoc with particle board !
Television advertising is so...
Television advertising is so ubiquitous but its the one conduit into most peoples lives that taps into greed and competitvness.
In the US is that sort of maintenanace a federal or state responsibility?
Does anyone remember the London Kings Cross fire? Another example of "small" governemnt at work.
I think there is more to be...
I think there is more to be gained from big government, crazy things like healthcare for everyone!
I just looked at pictures of the bridge, surely an engineer or at the very least a metal worker must have seen what a mess it was? And made a phone call?
Its a sense of public ownership that is lacking in the US I think, when everything is "user pays" I imagine its easy to get what you can from a service and then forget about it.
Sadly my country is going in the same direction.
I have thought about my origi...
I have thought about my original question somewhat, and now consider it rather dumb. I suppose I wanted to see a topic on the issue. This kind of bridge was so custom, and not even a good design, it should have been upgraded much sooner, and probably reinforced somewhere in that mess of old steel. I think someoene is going to take a fall for the inspection, and complete failure.
SDR, your comments are very good. Do you think a replacement solution, would have went through sooner, had the structure been more visible to the end users? All that steel under the deck, catching salt and moist air for 40 years. The states "busiest" bridge, taking a daily workout. Its another engineering diaster
episode for the History Channel.
When I crossed the Mississippi yesterday in Iowa, I thanked some 1000+ people for being competent.
There was an excellent...
There was an excellent documentary a few years back on PBS all about bridge builders. You might be surprised, but some of the most precarious-looking designs are also the most stable and long lasting.
I'm sure if you poke around on Google, you could find the documentary.
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