Bridge Collapse 1

CartLegger: 2nd Aug 2007 - 13:57 GMT

Ace reportage from CityNoise. It must be a first.

My heart goes out to you in all your shock, tragedy, and inconvenience.

Please do keep up the posts, when all the big cameras drift away in disinterest.

jack: 2nd Aug 2007 - 15:49 GMT

very sad news, i'm happy for the children in the bus.

serlingrod: 2nd Aug 2007 - 17:05 GMT

I can't believe this happened right in the heart of the city. I feel so bad for the families.

EvilGentleman: 2nd Aug 2007 - 19:08 GMT

Terrible tragedy, amazing photos. Thank you for thinking of sharing this with us, it really helps us understand the need to fix the crumbling highway infrastructure across North America.

Here in Quebec, we are presently having a crisis, as it is becoming all too clear that we have hundreds of disasters like the one on this page just waiting to happen. Over 100 of our overpasses and bridges are currently closed to heavy traffic, because they are in danger of collapse. Those are just the ones that were designes similarly to the de la Concorde overpass in Laval that collapsed last year, just north of Montreal. That does not take into account the crumbling structures with different designs, of which there are hundreds. Even the overpass near my house had chunks the size of a motorcycle falling off it last autumn. I still have to use it every day.

The Mercier Bridge heading to Kahnawake is in such bad shape, that sections of the sidewalk have collapsed into the river. Something has to be done, so that tragedies like this one in Minneapolis, or the one near Montreal last year, which killed 5, are not repeated.

Chiamattt: 2nd Aug 2007 - 22:17 GMT

If you read the news, you'll read that US infrastructure is crumbling. A significant number of bridges and roadways were built during the New Deal. The United States spends tax dollars on arms and war, Quebec spends tax dollars on 'maintaining culture' and separation. Just how many episodes like this will it take for people to wake up?

Chiamattt: 2nd Aug 2007 - 22:22 GMT

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0803/p01s05-usgn.html?page=1

Tyfoid Kid: 3rd Aug 2007 - 14:32 GMT

The finger pointing is already starting too. Governor Pawlenty (T-Paw) is up for election next year and he's been doing this no new taxes thing since 2000. Cause he's GOP he took a pledge from the Minnesota Tax Payers League (i.e the rich and stupid) for no new taxes and by gum he's stuck to it. He vetoed the last transportation bill. Woops!! When will the average guy who bitches about "my tax dollars" realize that taxes are not a user fee. It doesn't work that way.

little ukraine: 3rd Aug 2007 - 14:58 GMT

first of all thanks so much for sharing these photos. it feels a little more honest viewing these through the lens of our citynoise community than getting information elsewhere. it goes without saying that we all are keeping the great twin cities in our thoughts.

i had a sort of creepy experience with this - the night before it happened, a friend and i just happened to be discussing the probability of a bridge collapsing. we had both put the odds at extremely low, and now there is a panic with respect to the entire american roadway infrastructure.

Chiamattt: 4th Aug 2007 - 01:02 GMT

If the US government can't maintain US infrastructure, how in the hell are they going to rebuild the Afghan and Iraqi infrastructure? Seriously Americans...when will demanding change from government on a large-scale replace xbox360 and American Idol?

tom: 11th Aug 2007 - 17:12 GMT

The bridge was designed and built under a Democratic administration (Karl Rolvaag). Approximately half of the time since its construction there has been a Democratic governor in the state. The Democrats are now and generally have been the majority in the state legislature. But, let's blame the Republicans for a bridge collapse. And global warming. How about graffiti? That's a big problem, are there conservatives out there in the dark of night defacing railroad cars and buildings when they're not sabotaging bridges?

Tyfoid Kid: 24th Aug 2007 - 00:55 GMT

Both sides of the aisle have ignored this issue. My point is more to the line of thought that if the Dems had been in charge the Repulicans would have howled foul 'The Tax and Spend liberals can't keep the infrastructure going."

http://www.startribune.com/357/story/1375755.html

anonymous: 24th Aug 2007 - 23:20 GMT

Why is it that in such a tragic event, one has to be dumb and immature enough to make it a political issue. It doesn't whether it was a republican or a democrat was in office when this bridge collapsed. The bridge was still going to collapse unfortnately. The blame should go more towards those who inspected the bridge and said it was fine, or for those that may have errors up. To accuse the political party that is office is immature and pointless. I am a democrat and I still don't feel that it is necessary to make it a political issue.

EvilGentleman: 11th Aug 2008 - 03:12 GMT

A year has gone by, and this article has fallen to 25th place out of the 26 articles listed in the "Best of August 2007" page. I find it amazing how the best articles here are so seldom viewed. One day, someone will do a doctoral thesis about how audiences gravitate towards sensationalism and sex, and ignore serious material. I imagine this page may serve as an example of that. Low attendance aside, this is still one of the best articles on citynoise.