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| I-195 heading west into Providence (Source) |
Now d'ya see that opening photo? That's looking towards Providence, which lies between Chez Sarge and the aeroporto. Not usually a problem, up until late last year when someone discovered that the westbound portion of the Washington Bridge was, shall we say, not up to snuff, in fact it was absolutely unsafe. Here are photos of parts of the underside of that bridge -
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| (Source) |
This bridge being out of service has caused major traffic issues here in Little Rhody. The photo below shows traffic starting to pile up at the state line, some two and a half miles from the bridge. Want to go anywhere west of my AO¹, better add 30 minutes to an hour for that. I have friends who have to go that way everyday. They are pretty sick of it, I can tell you.
Now here's the bridge itself, a screen capture from an RI DOT traffic cam, as are all the traffic photos above. Note that the right side is devoid of traffic and the left has traffic going both ways. Now the bridge has four lanes going both ways, right now that's down to two each way. You might well imagine what a PITA² that is during rush hour.
Here's a map of the area I had to traverse Saturday in the afternoon to deliver my better half to the airfield.
The black is the path I typically travel to get to PVD, the blue circle is the approximate location of Chez Sarge, well the outer defenses anyway. (😉) The red circle is the Washington Bridge, the green circle is the airport. As the crow flies it's roughly eight miles to the airport, via road it's about 25. Yup, that big blue body of water is the thing everyone in Little Rhody has to go around when traveling.
Let's zoom in, shall we?
As I drove past, I saw that the flashing light thingee was some sort of fire department apparatus and that it was poised over a middling-sized industrial structure from which a great amount of smoke was billowing. Also some nasty looking flames were coming from an opening in the roof.
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| Looking west from the state line on I-195. (Source) |
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| The Washington St. Bridge looking west. (Source) |
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| Map of the area. (Source) |
Unless you head south to Newport and use the Claiborne Pell Newport Bridge and then the Jamestown Verrazano Bridge to cross the Bay. Which, as fate would have it, is also experiencing "construction delays." Ah, the joys of living in a small state ...
"Uh, Sarge, you didn't mention the orange circle on the map."
"What, the orange ... Oh yes, the orange circle!"
Returning home from the airport, I was looking forward to an uneventful drive in the rain when what did I see upon getting close to the town of Warren. Why yes, traffic, backed up for a couple of miles. Absolutely wonderful.
Waze showed a police car on the road, but nothing else. What could possibly be going on?
In the photo below, which I captured to show you the extent of the traffic, I didn't notice something. If you look very, very close, you might see something out of place.
Now in this next photo, which is a little closer, the thing I couldn't quite perceive above is now pretty obvious. Smoke, and lots of it!
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| OAFS Photo |
Now I had noticed some sort of weird looking crane or light pole with flashing lights before I saw the smoke. Instinct told me, "That ain't right."
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| OAFS Photo |
There's the thing with the flashing lights and the smoke is much clearer.
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| OAFS Photo |
I would have taken a photo, but traffic was moving, single file, through a cordon of police and firemen, would have been a ticket at least to have attempted a photo.
What could have been a nice quiet afternoon turned out to be not so quiet after all. I'm sure the folks who own that building had a far worse day than I.
Hope no one got hurt.
As of 1715 local, some two hours after I went through the area, traffic is still backed up and I can hear police and fire department sirens constantly going off in the distance. Another traffic cam view -
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| Warren, RI looking north along Route 136, the fire is south of here. (Behind the camera.) (Source) |
What a day, glad that's over.
That's all from Little Rhody.
Sarge, out.
¹ Area of Operations
² Pain in the arse
Glad to hear you got home safe and sound, if a bit frazzled. Was it drums or a computer game at full volume last night since your Batchin it?
ReplyDeletejuvat
Actually I spent quite a bit of time reading and also watching Brooklyn 99, a show I'd never watched before. It's really funny. I did listen to some music at volumes which would have made The Missus Herself admonish me with phrases like, "what are you, a teenager?"
DeleteWhen I looked at that map (and the traffic pictures) my first thought was "looks like there are a LOT of people there!" So looked.. the population density of Providence, Rhode Island (Wikipedia)- 10,373.47/sq mi (4,005.25/km2).
ReplyDeleteHave a good Sunday Sarge...
The area around Providence is very urban. There are quite a few people packed into that area. The rest of Rhode Island is fairly rural.
DeleteYou too have a good Sunday, Rob.
Perhaps a boat from Aponaug to Bristol? "One man's barrier is another man's highway"
DeleteBoat Guy
Ah, that would be nice.
DeleteSo, steel reinforcing rods have sheared off with concrete spalling and delaminating, wonder how long those conditions existed before that was discovered and someone decided to do something about it? The I35 bridge spanning the Mississippi collapsed back in 2007 because of a design flaw, an excessively thin gusset plate ripped along a line of rivets while 261 tons of construction supplies/equipment were ON the bridge, four of the eight lanes were closed for resurfacing and other work. That bridge had been ranked structurally deficient back in 2005 and was due for replacement in 2020.
ReplyDeleteThere's a an investigation as to how it happened. I suspect bribes, incompetence, and just the general lack of skill in organizing among some political classes in this state. But as the DOJ is doing the investigation (last I heard), I doubt anything will come of it. But yeah, this should have been spotted a long time ago. No doubt the legislature will make new laws rather than enforce the existing ones. Just like The Station Nightclub Fire 21 years ago.
DeleteSarge, that looks....horrific. All of it: the bridge, the traffic, the weather. One change that will come with the upcoming move is that our relatively straight shot to the airport (about 25 minutes on a good day) will become more like 45 minutes. On the bright side (in theory), there is a train that can get us there.
ReplyDeleteHaving, at one time, had a 130 mile/3 hour round trip commute, I hate commuting and traffic with a passion.
Infrastructure. This is going to come back to bite us all in the not too distant future.
Until that bridge collapse some years ago in Minnesota, I saw very little bridge maintenance going on in this state. Now it jams up traffic every summer. Infrastructure is critical, why don't politicians understand that? Oh yeah, they understand nothing other than the need to line their own pockets. Both damn parties.
DeleteSarge, any statement by a government official about "building" or "infrastructure" is only meant in the sense of "get more money that will be wasted", not actually improving anything.
DeleteToo true.
DeleteMaybe you could find a boat, like a RORO or LCT or LCVP. Just hop across the bay, drop the front ramp and invade the AO.... When it's time to go home, drive back on, up ramp, up hook, and return the way you came. As much work as you've done for the Navy, you should get a good deal on a used transport.
ReplyDeleteI'm heading for a smaller population soon. My town has a bit less than 10K in it, and it's still too big. I dunno how you can stand to breathe all that used air....
Where you looking at moving to? Ain’t many towns in Texas smaller than 10K. That having been said, I might also be interested. The ‘burg is getting a little too californicated now a days.
Deletejuvat
That is dangerous thinking Juvat, and thinking is the first step towards moving and maybe you forgot but moving sucks! :-)
DeleteSTxAR - Doable, there are boat ramps all up and down the Bay. But I'd need a security platoon to keep the yachtsmen and their henchmen from charging us exorbitant fees for docking and the like.
Deletejuvat - Stand and fight, don't let the bastards drive you from your home. And yeah, I'll second what Rob said, "moving sucks."
DeleteRob - Amen.
DeleteIt has been my experience any route that ventures into Assachusetts is destined for trouble.
ReplyDeleteThe part of Massachusetts we go through is very rural, nothing like Boston. If you go through Little Rhody to get to the airport, and you can, it's all built up neighborhoods, lots of traffic lights, very slow speed limits. Head up to I-195 and (it used to be) clear sailing all the way to T.F. Green. As long as one avoided rush hour.
DeleteBetter check the bridge warranty. Oh, wait
ReplyDeleteYup, thing is, no one was checking the bridge, and they're supposed to. But like so many state jobs in Rhode Island, they're a sinecure for politicians' relatives. Not really expected to work, just show up once or twice a week.
DeleteCrusty Old TV Tech here. Makes you wonder who is doing the inspecting. Any Civil Engineer knows the Northeastern Bridge Equation, "Fender Solvent + Steel Bolts/Rebar = Uncontrolled Self-Demolition".
ReplyDeleteSee my answer to Ritchie above, no one was inspecting. Seems some young whippersnapper of an actual engineer noticed it and reported it. All the politicos and bosses were all "this is my shocked face" and started making noise. This state is not run by the best and brightest. For that matter, none of them are with perhaps the exceptions of Texas and Florida.
DeleteWe live in the Twin Cities and I was in a meeting in downtown Minneapolis when the I-35 bridge collapsed. The bridge HAD been inspected. When the stored the supplies on it, driving on it felt funny to me, and I took other routes. Still stunned at the collapse. It seemed like five hundred cell phones went off at once. We didn't know what had happened. Well we knew everyone was calling us! (And still don't know; I'm inclined to the "inaccurate manual copy of drawing" and "delayed inspection and maintenance " idea, myself.) Complaints about bridge inspection work that blocks a traffic lane have disappeared.
ReplyDeleteInspect, inspect, inspect, if you find something wrong, fix it.
DeleteJudging by the amount of damage to the bridge, doing the necessary repairs would be more expensive than just starting over. To me, they're bandaging the worst of the damage to buy time for funding, designing and replacing a bridge on its last legs.
ReplyDeleteAccording to a recent story, they may well be doing that. Tear it down, build another.
DeleteI've repaired bridge with much less damage. They were replaced over the years to cut down the costs of repairing concrete that couldn't be examine, or repaired, without a substantial amount of demolition.
DeleteThey're thinking of starting over, probably more damage has been discovered than is being reported.
DeleteA couple years ago in my rural area, the MN DOT decided to replace a perfectly good highway bridge over a small river with culverts. Turned out under the river bottom was a deep layer of rocks and coarse gravel (the gravel pit on the other side of the highway should have been a clue). They couldn't control the upward seepage through the river bottom with sheet piling and pumps to be able to pour concrete to set the culverts (the contractor took his losses and just walked off the job). Meanwhile, the DOT got into a pissing contest with the DNR delaying things further. There was a detour for about a year and a half (unless you knew back gravel roads) until they finally put in another bridge, wider but otherwise the same as the original.
Delete"We're from the government, we're here to help."
DeleteGet yourself an amphibious Jeep or Kubelwagon, maybe a DUWK, and drive in style across the river...
ReplyDeleteAs to the bridge, YIKES!!! Our infrastructure wouldn't be crumbling if people would just do their darned jobs!!! And there's this show on the Science channel called "Engineering Catastrophes" wherein they follow, well, engineering catastrophes and the main cause of bridges falling down and killing people is... nobody did their darned jobs and inspected said bridges, which also applies to most other structures that fall and kill people. There's a reason that I don't like travelling over bridges, and that's I don't trust people to do... their... darned... jobs...
More and more I see government as an evil criminal mob to whom I have to pay protection to in order to live.
Just do your job. That should be our mantra from birth.
Delete