Edward 4America's Falling Apart: The Bridge and Road Crisis
August 1st 2008 17:40
I haven't blogged for about a week due to the fact that I was on a road trip to Minnesota for a friend's wedding. Because I live in Georgia this was a pretty long road trip, I got to see a lot of the country (including the Smokey Mountains which were beautiful). However, once we arrived in Minnesota I noticed there were road crews working on many of the bridges we passed over. My friend reminded me that it had been a year since the Minneapolis bridge collapse and the state had taken the job of repairing its infrastructure seriously. I decided to look into bridge and road integrity on a national level, and what I found was scary.
There are approximately 600,000 bridges across the United States. According to the Federal Highway Administration, a quarter of these bridges are at risk. Some bridges, (including one in St. Paul, just miles from the Minneapolis bridge collapse) have been deemed structurally deficient since the eighties, but have not been closed down or repaired. One of the reasons for this is money. It is estimated that it would cost ten billion dollars a decade for two decades to repair all of America's bridges to good working order.
Unfortunately the money just isn't there. Some of the funds come from the Highway Trust Fund which Americans pay through a tax on gasoline. But the high price of gasoline has led many to find alternative methods of transportation, leaving the Highway Trust Fund in a lurch. Furthermore, the Bush administration predicted that sometime in the next fiscal year (after October 2008) the highway account will be completely depleted. Repairs can't be made if there is no money to make them.
Although it unnerved me to see so many road crews working on the bridges in and around Minneapolis, what really scared me was when we started heading south and the road crews disappeared but the bridges didn't. Minnesotans were awoken from their complacency through a tragic event, but what about the rest of the country? We often put aside these structural issues, thinking them unimportant until tragedy strikes (i.e. the levy system in New Orleans) Unfortunately its the simple and unsensational problems that slip past our radar and can become a very complicated, very lethal situation.
The Price of Neglect
There are approximately 600,000 bridges across the United States. According to the Federal Highway Administration, a quarter of these bridges are at risk. Some bridges, (including one in St. Paul, just miles from the Minneapolis bridge collapse) have been deemed structurally deficient since the eighties, but have not been closed down or repaired. One of the reasons for this is money. It is estimated that it would cost ten billion dollars a decade for two decades to repair all of America's bridges to good working order.
Unfortunately the money just isn't there. Some of the funds come from the Highway Trust Fund which Americans pay through a tax on gasoline. But the high price of gasoline has led many to find alternative methods of transportation, leaving the Highway Trust Fund in a lurch. Furthermore, the Bush administration predicted that sometime in the next fiscal year (after October 2008) the highway account will be completely depleted. Repairs can't be made if there is no money to make them.
Although it unnerved me to see so many road crews working on the bridges in and around Minneapolis, what really scared me was when we started heading south and the road crews disappeared but the bridges didn't. Minnesotans were awoken from their complacency through a tragic event, but what about the rest of the country? We often put aside these structural issues, thinking them unimportant until tragedy strikes (i.e. the levy system in New Orleans) Unfortunately its the simple and unsensational problems that slip past our radar and can become a very complicated, very lethal situation.
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Comment by Natalie 2
My Life My Muse
Beta Girl Blog
I live about 3 1/2 hours from Minneapolis, and many of my friends live there. Any one of them could have been on that bridge that day. It is sobering to see all of the construction, which means that there was a lot of work that was being neglected, but as you said, it is even more frightening to see the lack of construction as soon as you leave the area.
Great post.
Comment by Edward 4
Shout Politics
The Hospital Blues
Painting in a Cave
The funny thing is that I didn't even know that today was the one year anniversary of the bridge collapse until I started researching the info for my blog.
Thanks for the comment.