In little danger. by Barbie Kunkelova

The roads, railways, airways, waterways, canals, pipelines and highways that make up the infrastructure in the US are often taken for granted. Yet a disruption to a single one of those can have crucial consequences across others. In Minnesota, close to Minneapolis, a busy bridge Interstate 35W collapsed during the rush hour on August 1. It carried 141,000 cars every day, 13 people died. In 1990, the government rated it "structurally deficient" because of corrosion but they didn't think of it as being unsafe. DOT (Department of Transportation) presented an estimated figure of the costs stemming from the collapse. The total (the emergency response, site cleanup, inspections, traffic diversions and the constructions of a new steel-deck truss span) will cost the government $393 million (according to USA Today). It should be all done (with one of the most important Minneapolis arteries back in function) by the end of 2008. However, the collapse drew attention to the overall infrastructure in the US. And what did the investigators find out? 35 busy bridges across the country need a construction pretty badly, plus the roads and utilities and other basics. The government decided to focus on bridges similar to Minneapolis'; it is 700 of them in the US. Thousands of US' bridges are between 30 to 70 years old. The oldest ones need a reconstruction the most since the trucks used to be much lighter back in those days. The Senate excluded $1 billion to fix bridges. Now, working on the Minneapolis bridge, the project manager, Jon Chiglo, will be motivating his workers 6 days a week, 20 hours a day & until the end. They will try to get done ahead of schedule, that could earn them a nice amout of money, $27 million.

related story: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071102/ap_on_re_us/bridge_collapse_groundbreaking;_ylt=AnVaRNMLa3Zr7AibquUDHuGs0NUE

by Barbie Kunkelova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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