Minnesota Bridge Collapse

The day before yesterday, during early evening rush hour traffic, the I-35W bridge spanning the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, Minnesota, suddenly collapsed, dropping traffic on it sixty feet down to the river and into it. As of this writing, searches for bodies are still ongoing, but there are already four confirmed deaths in this terrible tragedy, with the number expected to rise. When something like this happens somewhere, it’s not just a local problem, but one that has national ramifications. The Interstate Highway System, begun under the Eisenhower Administration during the 1950s and constructed over the next twenty-some-odd years, is beginning to age. And, other than resurfacing, or repairs to obviously damaged sections (the area of I-75 that runs through Gainesville is especially prone to sinkholes), what has really been done to assure that the integrity of these roads has withstood the long march of time? In particular, what about the countless overpasses one crosses, not just going down one of these Interstate Routes, but also those, many in number, that other roads cross the Interstate with? To be sure, the stress on a short overpass wouldn’t necessarily be as severe as one spanning a big river, but some of the larger interchanges in big cities contain some extreme examples of road design. In the middle of these enormous, intricate confluences of highways, there are usually long stretches of road that are elevated (sometimes very high up), giving them the equivalence with a bridge going over a river, as far as stress factors are concerned. The day after the collapse, I saw on WGN-Chicago that Illinois Governor Blagojevich had ordered a special statewide detailed inspection of Illinois bridges, and I suspect that this sort of reaction will be duplicated throughout much of the country. But that still leaves the question of whether bridges and overpasses that are decades-old shouldn’t just be torn down and rebuilt after a specified period of years, just as a matter of course. After all, car manufacturers urge owners to get various parts of their vehicles replaced after a specified period, so why not the same with crucial sections of road as well? The bridge that collapsed Wednesday was forty years old and had passed previous inspections. Which brings up another question. Since I’m only a layman and not an engineer, please forgive my ignorance if I ask how one can determine and certify the safety of a bridge or overpass on the strength of inspections, anyway.

I suspect that, after the news of this tragedy begins to fade, first from the headlines, and then from the news altogether, that any common sense proposals to effectively renovate our highways, especially where bridges and overpasses are concerned, will be quietly tabled or watered down to a point where they are meaningless. In the meantime, my heart goes out to those directly affected by this Minneapolis bridge collapse as well as their families and friends.