Posted on 11/02/2009 10:49:36 AM PST by Zetman
The Bay Bridge reopened just after 9 a.m. today, six days after a repair job on a cracked structural beam on the eastern span fell apart and plunged onto the upper deck.
Tests conducted overnight and this morning on an altered version of that repair job showed that the fix was holding, Caltrans spokesman Bart Ney said.
At 9:01 a.m., a fleet of five California Highway Patrol cars escorted the first private vehicles allowed onto the westbound upper deck since the span was shut down Tuesday evening.
About 10 minutes later, the lower deck reopened for traffic heading to the East Bay.
"We're happy to be returning the Bay Bridge to public service," Ney said.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
Too stupid to succeed comes right after that.
The old bridge could have been refitted for less than 1/20 of the cost, but Oakland felt slighted because you couldn't have an unobstructed view of the dumps from the old bridge.
Agree!
The new design is very questionable at best. The concept of a 'self-anchoring' suspension in bay mud is absurd.
can you imagine these fat bureaucrats who normally go home at 3:30 and haven’t worked on friday in years “working “on that old bridge?? What a knee slapping joke.
http://www.sci-experiments.com/BrokenBridge/BrokenBridge.html
Whoever wrote that description is a fairly good guesser, but not likely an engineer. - His suggestion of a connection between a rod and a cable by crimping is pure fabtasy.
I noticed that one of the commentors at the end had the same reaction that I initially did: Why didn’t they simply re-fab a pair of new eye-bars? It couldn’t have been any more time consuming than the method that they chose, and the plans for the bridge are in the flat files at the office building on the bridge approach.
I suspect that the main reason for the crack is that the bars were not carrying a uniform load. I don’t buy into the idea that the crack was caused by corrosion which was due to lack of paint.
I have no faith in that repair.
Read up.
The Bay Bridge section collapse killed one person. The other 46 were on the 880 freeway in Oakland in the same 89 quake.It was a 2 level concrete elevated freeway where the upper deck pancaked onto the lower one.
Happened to read this as I live in the area (going on the bridge today). The new suspension segment is not anchored in mud. They went down to bedrock. That's the reason they couldn't put it on the south side of the present bridge.
The anchors for the current cantilever section are in mud. They couldn't find bedrock and drove 90 foot wood poles (trees) down in the mud for anchorage.
“So, San Francisco should be back to “normal” by this afternoon.”
Define normal. On second thought, please don’t when “normal” is used with Gay Frisco.
Gee Mr brilliant, why don’t you read a bit further.
You’ll find that the bedrock is only providing vertical support, due to its considerable depth, and the lateral stability is still dependent on the bay mud.
Do you understand anything?
Both of us have a strong pull from the get-go to go the direction you mentioned. I will have to admit to thinking the old bridge was problematic. I believe the recent winds closed that bridge for a few days due to a blown down cable and cable assembly.
Does the new bridge facilitate an increased volume of flow?
If you think nothing justifies the new bridge at this point, what would you do with the three quarters of it that already exists?
I’m not an engineer. Perhaps you’ve read more details about the old bridge than I have, and are certain it could have lasted another fifty years or so.
If that’s the case, I can see why you’re not in favor of this.
The new bridge will not change the capacity, since the western link is still the original suspension span.
The arguments against the old truss bridge are all disingenuous. The unions are the driving force behind the new eastern span. We’re stuck with it now, until an earthquake dumps it in the mud.
Are both of those double laned strips going to be east-bound?
That’s interesting. If that’s true, what a joke.
We’re talking about the bay bridge, so I assumed you were talking about the Nimitz Freeway collapse which killed about 45 in the same quake in post 16.
Sorry, but you should ahve made it clearer.
The new part is side by side instead of two decks vertically. When it gets to treasure Island in the middle it has to transition to one above the other , since the other half and the tunnel is that way.
Rode about a lane from the repairs this morning on the way into SF.
Editor-Surveyor believes the earth is the center of the universe, appendicitis can be cured without drugs or surgery and that high BP is caused by taking the medicine to keep it low.
Do you live in the area?
Actually I was talking about the cable that came down last week, not the section that collapsed during the earthquake years ago.
Yes I’ve seen pictures of the new section. It looks good too.
The History Channel had a one hour presentation showing how this was being built. It was quite impressive.
Yes
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