“The spire of the new San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge eastern span majestically climbs hundreds of feet above the bay, an emerging icon of California’s engineering and aesthetic prowess,” according to the Sacramento Bee.
“Scheduled for completion and public use in 2013 at a projected cost of $6.3 billion, the bridge is the largest public works project in state history. Its designers placed one quality above all others: the strength to withstand the strongest anticipated earthquake.
“Yet a Bee investigation has found that the state Department of Transportation technician who conducted key testing to ensure structural integrity of the span’s foundation was later disciplined for fabricating test results on other projects. The technician, Duane Wiles, also failed to verify that his testing gauge was operating properly, as required by Caltrans to ensure the gauge’s accuracy, before he examined parts of the Bay Bridge tower foundation.”
“When Caltrans officials became aware of the problems with Wiles they did not thoroughly investigate his earlier work – despite public safety concerns raised by other test employees and an anonymous whistleblower.”
The rest of the article is here.
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I chuckled every time I heard the union ad than ran around Labor Day, suggesting that we needed the jobs act so we could build another Golden Gate Bridge like we did in the depression.
Back then: Yes we did build some amazing things like the entire Bay Bridge,not just the easiest part which is the eastern span. They used revenue bonds, which were paid back by the tolls [which were about $19 in 2006 money] and completed in about three years at a cost of one billion dollars in today’s money. This included the Eastern span, the Treasurer Island tunnel, which at that time was the biggest bore ever done I believe, the DOUBLE suspension bridge that is the western span [the central anchor has more concrete than the Empire State building] and all of the access roads on both sides!
Today: Rather than do a $900 million earthquake retrofit, our modern wizards decided to build a new span that they said would cost about two billion. The reason was that the old span was dangerous and of course that was over twenty years ago after the 1989 earthquake. So after many years of fighting over the design and other red tape we are approaching completion at a cost of much more than the $6.3 billion that the Bee has listed and of course much of the work was done in China! However, there will be a nice bike lane that goes only as far as Treasurer Island that cost about $135 million: Can you imagine what the toll would have to be to have that self-funded?
Yes, it would help us recover from the recession IF we had the will to build a second span across the bay, build the Auburn Dam as well as expanding the Shasta Dam and maybe a few new freeways while we are at it. It would be a double blessing if we actually used American steel and concrete! Sadly the same red-tape that ties the hands of business these days even keeps the governments from doing some of the things they could do that would be helpful.
John
It just goes to show that the more things change the more they stay the same. They didn’t give the wire contract to Roebling and the low bidder was purposely deceptive on the tests. By the time the fraud was discovered… well just lets say the bad wire is still in the cables of the Brooklyn Bridge.
I’m not sure people how people like this Duane Wiles sleep at night.
OK – good work to uncover this situation. The inspector needs to be investigated, and the bridge re-inspected by a third party
The Bee is reporting that two individuals have been fired.
John