The five states with the most deficient bridges are: It includes some well-known bridges, including the Throggs Neck in New York, Yankee Doodle in Connecticut, and Memorial Bridge in Washington, D.C.īelieve it or not, vehicles cross deficient bridges approximately 185 million times each day. The American Road and Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA) published a list (based on Transportation Department data) of 55,710 bridges across the United States that are considered structurally deficient. Check out this article from NPR to learn more about the change and how it could impact future infrastructure projects. The original announcement of this regulatory rollback was overshadowed by a newsworthy presidential press conference. The repeal of it means many of the projects that could be initiated to replace roads and bridges damaged by Hurricane Harvey may not be designed and built to withstand another similar flooding event.
The original order was created to protect taxpayer dollars when used to develop projects in flood-prone areas. Learn more about Queensferry Crossing on its official website.Įxecutive order eases infrastructure rulesĪ few weeks before Hurricane Harvey hit the Texas and Louisiana coasts, President Trump signed an executive order to reverse an Obama-era one that, among other things, required roads and bridges to be designed to survive rising sea levels and other issues related to climate change. This is an important feature in Scotland’s often extreme climate conditions. Unlike its two predecessors, the latest bridge should be able to stay open no matter the weather because it has been designed with special wind and weather shields to protect it. The new structure was finished in the current millennium. Its replacement, the Forth Road Bridge, was completed in 1964. The original Forth Rail Bridge was constructed in 1883. In fact, the area spanned by the new crossing has been home to bridges built in three different centuries. It is the tallest bridge in the United Kingdom at 689 feet high and was constructed out of 35,000 tons of steel.Īmazingly, the Queen of England cut the ribbon on the new bridge, a role she also played when its predecessor opened more than 50 years ago. The 23,000 miles of cable that suspend it are enough to - almost - wrap around the globe. The new $1.7 billion Queensferry Crossing connects Edinburgh, the capital of the country, to areas in the north.Īccording to reports, it is the longest three-tower cable-stayed bridge in the world. New Yorkers had many reasons to celebrate the new Tappan Zee Bridge in August, but that structure was dwarfed by another bridge that opened in Scotland just a few weeks later. So, you think THAT bridge is a record-breaker? And check out this retrospective about its construction in the same publication.
Learn more about the opening of this record-breaking structure in this story in the New York Times. The bridge can handle 140,000 vehicles each day.The two spans are held up by 192 cables stretched among eight 419-foot angled towers.Use of these panels helped speed construction and make it more cost-efficient. Approximately 330,000 cubic yards of concrete were used to build the structure, including almost 6,000 precast road deck panels.More than 1,000 cylindrical piles were inserted into the bedrock below the Hudson River to create the 41 pillars that hold up each half of the bridge.Here are a few additional facts and figures related to this extraordinary double span structure: The structure cost approximately $4 billion to design, plan, and complete. It is a bridge for the record books: the largest built in the region in more than 50 years. It took almost 20 years of discussion and four years of almost super-human labor by more than 7,000 workers, but the new Tappan Zee Bridge, just north of New York City, has finally opened to traffic. A record-setting bridge opens in New York State Here’s some newsworthy updates in the infrastructure world. Our industry is constantly changing and evolving. 15, 2017 Bridge Masters Bridge Work, Bridges and Utilities, Innovations, News
0 kommentar(er)
