The NY times has introduced a new feature, Retro Report, which looks at past stories in the light of the early 21st century. The first article is about the 2007 collapse of the I-35W Bridge spanning the Mississippi River in Minneapolis. Thirteen people died. Nearly 150 others were injured. Many vehicles fell into the river. The problem was there from the day the bridge was completed in the 1960s.
I've written about our deficient infrastructure often. But we're still not spending the money we need to. Of 607,000 bridges in this country, more than 65,000 are deemed “structurally deficient” by experts. Some 20,000 bridges around the country are labeled “fracture critical,” which means that the entire structure could collapse should a single critical component break. At least 8,000 bridges fall into both of those categories. Most bridges are meant to last 50 years; those classified as structurally deficient are, on average, a good deal older than that.
When will we learn?
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