Study declares 12.8% of California bridges 'structurally deficient'

The nation’s bridges need some support.

One in every nine bridges across the country -- or 11.5% -- were deemed potentially hazardous and “structurally deficient,” according to a study released Wednesday morning by the organization Transportation For America.

California ranked 18th in the report’s list of state rankings with 12.8% its bridges deemed structurally deficient. Pennsylvania ranked worst with 26.5%.

 “A structurally deficient bridge is not an unsafe bridge, but it is a warning sign,” said James Corless, director of Transportation For America.

Corless said the country was in the “middle of a very big and very important debate about the nation’s infrastructure” and said “we all know America’s infrastructure is decidedly middle aged.”

There are about 600,000 bridges nationally and more than 24,500 in California. The report targeted the 10 Freeway bridge across Normandie Avenue as one of California’s busiest structurally deficient bridges. About 321,000 vehicles cross that bridge each day.

The report also ranked the 100 counties with the highest percentage of structurally deficient bridges. Nemaha County in Nebraska topped the list with 120 out of 194 bridges rated structurally deficient. San Francisco County was the only one in California to make the list with 40 of 116 bridges, or 34.5%, as structurally deficient.

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Photo: Los Angeles officials have talked about replacing the 6th Street bridge over the L.A. River. Credit: Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Inside observer]

Please tell us which bridges are "structurally deficient!"

[BenFlynn]

I think these bridges are just being greedy. Don't they understand that we are running a deficit? They should just be prepared to make do with less. Maybe it is time to cut some of these underperforming bridges.

[affableman]

Wonder if the teabaggers even care?

[Leonard C. Marshman]

Bad bridges, bad roads, bad schools, and bad hospitals.
So, again, why are we expending ANY time, energy, or
$ on high-speed rail. That's going to help inter-city
commuters, school kids, and the medically-indigent...HOW?

[What's a girl to do]

WOW, someone sure has a keen eye for the obvious.

[TOM]

look here:
http://t4america.org/resources/bridges/

[KeriBrch]

What do you mean you have been putting the gas tax in the genereal fund and spending it on social programs? I thought the gas tax was for roads....go figure

[Geox]

A link to the report would have been nice:

http://t4america.org/resources/bridges/

[Nancy]

The U.S. Government doles out billons of dollars every year in Foreign Aid, is rebuilding Iraq and Afghanistan, and spends millions on the illegal aliens who invade our borders. Yet somehow can't find the resources to support this country's own infrastructure. This is just as ridiculous as having a father/mother feed and cloth the kids next door, while letting their own children go hungry and bare.

[Phdtrojan]

This is a beautiful bridge!

[Cyndy Greger]

Yes, in the interest of public safety and knowledge...it would be helpful to be directed to a website that has the bridges listed.

Just like when studies come out re: hospital error rates and such...if someone has done a study why can't we, THE DRIVING PUBLIC, get access to the information!?

This information is useless without the supporting detail.

[Esteban]

Transportation For America info:

http://t4america.org/blog/2011/03/30/national-report-and-interactive-map-shows-the-state-of-our-nations-bridges/

[Daniel]

This is what happens when politicians keep illegally diverting money collected for infrustructure and roads to balance a budget full of spending promises made to their union thugs who contributed a lot money to get them elected.

[Alice Peters]

But only BIG GOVERNMENT maintains and rebuilds bridges. And even if we DO have to repair them, there's no good reason bridge construction should cost one dollar more today than it did 20 years ago!

NO NEW TAXES! It's just all going to waste and fraud, like infrastructure, and administration of CalTrans and the DMV and food stamps, and medical care for those who can't afford insurance on minimum wage and part-time jobs, and all that other stuff we hate! No new taxes!

And how many of the bridges are CITIZENS, after all? Plus, surely there's a way we can keep illegals from driving on them! THEY'RE the reasons the bridges are so tired!

[Scott]

Link to the actual study?

[Chris]

cool that %88 are in great shape !

[William Joseph Miller]

While our bridges are collapsing, guess what! The Republicans are insisting that Gov. Brown OK tax subsidies to corporations who leave California. Actually if we repaired our infrastructure, we could put a dent in our unemployment.
Before people get killed by collapsing bridges (something that actually happened in Minneapolis in 2008), we need to get rid of Prop 13 and tax the rich. Giving the Rich tax breaks was supposed to create jobs - but we have a 12% unemployment rate, which will go up when thousands of teachers, policemen and firefighters lose their jobs. Let's make the rich pay more, so that the common ordinary citizens doesn't play Russian roulette with his life every time he drives over a bridge.

[Joseph L Cooke]

Who benefits from the results of the study? Who paid for the study? Were the results of the study audited? If so, by whom?

[Steve Crisp]

Why yes affableman, the members of the Tea Party do indeed care.

We care that cities and states have been forced to cover unfunded mandates by a federal government that has well overstepped their Constitutional bounds.

We care that the federal government has instituted confiscatory tax policies that drain local businesses and individuals of their hard earned money, leaving a pittance for states to actually upgrade their infrastructure.

We care that so much money is being wasted on idiotic social programs designed to keep ignorant, lazy people on the public dole so they will keep voting for the same fraudulent politicians.

We care that the leftists have given us laws that result in unions so corrupt they are sucking the public trough dry AND causing the manufacturing sector to relocate to places where labor costs are reasonable with respect to the local economies.

We care that local politicians are plowing huge amounts of money into failing schools to placate the teachers unions, so much that little is left for the things that local government is actually responsible for -- like fixing bridges.

We care that morons in Congress have borrowed so much money that the interest we are paying could rebuild our national infrastructure several times over if the states and their people were actually allowed to keep that money and use it locally.

So what is it that you actually care about apart from scamming your supposed share of something you most likely didn't earn to start with?

[Jim]

We should probable cut taxes.

[D.Woodward Van Nuys.]

The comment by Ben Flynn that bridges are being greedy sounds like a comment from some sort of boob that thinks bridges are living things.Boy has he got it wrong.sounds like some moron that thinks bridges and roads and things should last forever/sounds like a tea bagger.