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Memphis bridge beam breaks

Volunteer

The bridge carries I-40 traffic across the Mississippi River. Seems like non-destructive testing should have found this way before the actual break. Also looks like a crack on the left side of the beam in the photo. 


 
May 14, 21 9:33 am
tduds

On Infrastructure Week no less! How embarrassing.

May 14, 21 10:58 am  · 
2  · 

Duct tape will fix that right up.

May 14, 21 11:01 am  · 
 · 
Almosthip

I heard Gorilla Glue is pretty strong

May 14, 21 11:10 am  · 
 · 

Sobo is actually the best of them all.

May 14, 21 2:18 pm  · 
1  · 

JB Weld

May 14, 21 3:40 pm  · 
2  · 
Non Sequitur

not enough structural green paint


May 14, 21 11:25 am  · 
6  · 

This is really, really, really embarassing and bad. We need to stop with the Martian Hyperloop fantasies and tax rich people so we can, at minimum, take care of our infrsatructure. 

May 14, 21 12:33 pm  · 
9  · 
SneakyPete

That is terrifying.

May 14, 21 12:53 pm  · 
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There is no profit on maintenance, just a tax bill to pay some laborers. But with big shiny fantasy projects there are tens of billions in profits and even more in cost overruns that reward all the usual suspects. Failure of the existing infrastructure is cited as the reason for the new projects ...

Economics at work.

Report Card on America's Infrastructure
https://infrastructurereportca...

May 14, 21 1:37 pm  · 
3  · 
JLC-1

that's the model applied in most "trickle-down" economies; when corporate shills get into government, they make a functioning program fail, then justify going private and awarding contracts to their friends and family.

May 14, 21 2:09 pm  · 
9  · 
x-jla

Private construction companies take on a huge amount of liability for such a project. It’s within their own self interest to make sure that it doesn’t fail. Regardless, when you replace the word
private with government,

May 14, 21 3:38 pm  · 
1  · 

Exactly.

May 14, 21 3:38 pm  · 
 · 
x-jla

It’s not going to eliminate corruption or ensure quality.

May 14, 21 3:39 pm  · 
 · 
tduds

There's plenty of money to be made on maintenance. What's missing is the political glory moment. Hard to claim credit and boost your profile when there's no big ribbon cutting ceremony, so instead they throw dollars at new shiny objects to stand in front of. It's a magpie culture we're livin in.

May 14, 21 3:51 pm  · 
3  · 
JLC-1

65% of my work is updating houses built 40-30 years ago, plenty of money in maintenance.

May 14, 21 4:26 pm  · 
2  · 
tduds

buy buy buy!

May 14, 21 11:12 pm  · 
 · 
newguy

"that's the model applied in most "trickle-down" economies; when corporate shills get into government, they make a functioning program fail, then justify going private and awarding contracts to their friends and family."

This is the Chicago Boys style of government advocacy for the private sector. "The Shock Doctrine"  by Naomi Klein details this quite well and is a fairly digestible read for how trickle-down neo-liberalism as a model of economic control has been invading the public sector for decades.  First perfected abroad, and then deployed domestically.

May 17, 21 2:37 pm  · 
1  · 
t a z

Imma leave this here:




Jun 15, 21 11:00 pm  · 
4  · 

^ Practical Engineering is a great site. 

Jun 16, 21 10:01 am  · 
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x-jla

My kid cracked his iPhone screen and told me it’d be cheaper to just buy him the new iPhone.

Jun 26, 21 10:27 am  · 
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Non Sequitur

it's cheaper to let them use the broken phone.

Jun 26, 21 3:19 pm  · 
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t a z

Btw this is the bridge repair sequence.  I think after 6 weeks they are on to the permanent repair phase of the fix.  Post post-tensioning if you will.


Jun 28, 21 6:52 pm  · 
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