Fracture critical bridges, of which there are a total of about 18,000 throughout the U.S., lack redundancy, which means that in the event of a steel member’s failure there is no backup; it’s going down. That’s what happened to the bridge in Minnesota (5 years ago).

For a map of bridges in need of repair, check this out!

http://saveourbridges.com/basics.html

Thankfully, we don’t have any critical issues nearby but I’ll bet some of you do. The money for repairing these bridges comes from the state via the user’s gas tax. According to the discussion today on NPR the money’s there but the politicians would rather it be spent where they can get better photo ops and press.

 

Great find, Dave! Fortunately none of the bad bridges are in my area. Apparently there are a few here though.