Trucks And Bridges

Published: Aug 9, 2007

Here in Florida we travel across bridges and overpasses constantly and mostly think nothing about that feat. But now the Sunshine Skyway Bridge accident comes back to haunt Floridians. Even as it is remembered, we can at least say it was an accident. A freighter slams into a support column during a squall; while we do have to admit protective bumpers around the support columns had never been installed, there is still some rationale to that accident. Maybe, just maybe there is some rationale to the Minnesota disaster.

In the last 20 or so years highway trucks (18-wheelers) have been increasing in length and weight. Sometimes I see two smaller trailers attached to one cab which makes the whole thing very large and much heavier.

Big rigs take a toll on our highways and our bridges. It doesn't take an expert in bridge maintenance to assume that a bridge built in 1967 probably did not have that kind of weight limit in mind.

I marvel at those rigs that carry automobiles. I remember when five cars were the max. Now you might see a rig carrying seven or eight vehicles. How do they manage?

To me the collapse of the Minnesota bridge highlights, in a tragic way, what I have been grumbling about for years. Those rigs are getting way too big to handle safely. I avoid driving near them. I am a nervous wreck if they are immediately behind me.

As a novice and far from an expert in bridge safety, I think there is perhaps another way to look at our bridges and their maintenance.

A Tribune article heralds the fact that the 124-year-old Brooklyn Bride is strong and safe. Much of the bridge's key structural skeleton is original. However the U.S. Department of Transportation rated the Brooklyn Bride structurally deficient last year. What amazes me is that the newer approach ramps are deteriorating, while its oldest parts are its most solid. Has this something to do with quality control, bridge design?

I don't doubt that down the road there will be Senate hearings on design, maintenance and weight limits on all bridges at the cost of many taxpayer dollars just to come to some of the above conclusions. Well, maybe not. How big is the truck industry lobby?

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Doris Guenther is retired and a longtime resident of Tampa.