If in fact the bridge collapsed because a truck hit a bearing member, then it has nothing to do with poor maintenance of the structure. In any case, until they can figure out what happened it's all speculation.
If in fact the bridge collapsed because a truck hit a bearing member, then it has nothing to do with poor maintenance of the structure. In any case, until they can figure out what happened it's all speculation.
In reply to stuart in mn:
They have webcams on the I5 bridges. As soon as they release the footage, it will be very clear...
In reply to Javelin:
They also have an eyewitness who confirmed the truck's oversized load hit the bridge.
bgkast wrote: Holy Berk!Guessing the Columbia River Crossing funds will be diverted to fix that.
You mean actually using the money for something worthwhile? Makes sense to me. The CRC is unnecessary and poorly designed. It needs to be built further east to support the Camas area. It doesn't add any more lanes to the existing I5 bridge spans and only add bicycle and MAX lanes. The Bike and MAX lanes can be served with a smaller, lower down lifting span.
It won't fix the issues with I5 where it goes through Portland which is the real issue with I5 (I drive it nearly every day from Portland to Vancouver, once you get past the stupid short carpool lane and the idiots that can't merge, the traffic speeds up across the bridge.)
At this point, there's way too many politicians involved with that mess to get anything worthwhile done.
I'm really glad no one was seriously hurt in this collapse and hopefully the cause is found quickly and the crossing restored without too much delay.
For those b!tcning about lack of maintenance, contact your legislators. They control the funding and there hasn't ever been a permanent funding mechanism for transportation. The best there has ever been is 6 year funding bills. Since 2011, America hasn't even had a 6 year plan to fund transportation. Tell your legislators to establish a permanent funding mechanism and tell them what you are willing to accept as a means to pay for it whether that is an increase in the motor fuel user fee (gas tax), tolls, vehicle mileage fees, national sales tax, legalized marijuana taxes, or some other method. We have to be willing to pay for our infrastructure and convince the legislators that they need to provide funds to maintain it. There are far fewer ribbon cutting ceremonies and photo ops for the politicians when $ is spent on maintenance instead of building new roads & bridges.
/soapbox rant.
Secretariata wrote: For those b!tcning about lack of maintenance, contact your legislators. They control the funding and there hasn't ever been a permanent funding mechanism for transportation. The best there has ever been is 6 year funding bills. Since 2011, America hasn't even had a 6 year plan to fund transportation. Tell your legislators to establish a permanent funding mechanism and tell them what you are willing to accept as a means to pay for it whether that is an increase in the motor fuel user fee (gas tax), tolls, vehicle mileage fees, national sales tax, legalized marijuana taxes, or some other method. We have to be willing to pay for our infrastructure and convince the legislators that they need to provide funds to maintain it. There are far fewer ribbon cutting ceremonies and photo ops for the politicians when $ is spent on maintenance instead of building new roads & bridges. /soapbox rant.
how many bridges could be built with the public portion of just one new football or baseball stadium?
^^^Further to that, somebody is trying to tell me that the bridges were built (lots of $$$) but nobody planned to pay for maintenance for them? Why should the taxpayer pay more money due to stupid financial decisions the government makes (spending money they don't have/allocating it inappropriately).
novaderrik wrote: how many bridges could be built with the public portion of just one new football or baseball stadium?
I agree with you and HTG.
Not trying to politicize this thread, but we have to make these points to the politicians that make policy decisions regarding how the $ they control is spent.
hire the engineers who designed this bridge
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAqKdX3rXi4
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