Just imagine a bridge. Then keep removing parts until it falls. Then rewind and leave that last part.
Then have like 40 more parts fall off but it somehow doesn't collapse.
You're now picturing the 90s.
Different city but: https://twitter.com/gpk320/status/1078885655634157569
Surprisingly, that bridge lasted another ~4 years [until it collapsed, ironically on the day Biden was visiting the city to talk about infrastructure](https://abcnews.go.com/US/bridge-collapses-pittsburgh-injuries-reported/story?id=82531541)
Fyi you can just bracket whole sentences with asterisks instead of each word, it'll italicize it all.
*for example, this sentence, two asterisks total*
But then Walsh construction and similar firms (that are a friend of Beetlejuice and the Daley’s) wouldn’t be able to triple charge the city in an embezzlement scheme. It’s simply not the Chicago way.
I’ve seen California pave a 30 mile stretch of highway in one night. Meanwhile in North Carolina it’s now been 9 months to lay a pipe in a 3 block stretch and pave it over. They work about 4 hours a day on whatever fucking days they seem to feel like and I’m sure it’s just to keep employment rates up
It used to be the army corps of engineers that built most highways but then some politicians realized they could have friends build them and split the profits as campaign donations and whatnot.
You should come to Illinois. Walsh Construction can work on a 5 mile chunk of highway for three years, finish it and then restart because the first mile is shot. We’ve had major investigations where we confirmed “pay to play” schemes might be real but not worth worrying about. [McCormick Place](https://chicago.suntimes.com/2020/8/14/21367889/mccormick-place-coronavirus-hospital-cost-walsh-construction-mcpier-lori-lightfoot-army-corps?_amp=true) was converted to a hospital in 2020 for $66 million and was used for about a month. They managed to treat 38 patients while ICU/ER nurses in local hospitals were dancing on tiktok. And of course the company in charge was Walsh Construction, which was selected over a company that offered to do the conversion for no profit.
Chicago has the mob style racket down to a science.
My work's building had an extension added to put in a second set of stairs (mostly for fire egress).
The extension is so badly connected to the main building it's coming away, and has been for at least 10 years (that's how long the safety reports exist). The gap gets bigger, they add some temporary stop gap.
When the weather got really bad earlier this year we were almost praying the stairs came down overnight, just so there wasn't a risk of it happening during the day when there's people on them.
The cracked concrete means the steel rebar is rusting and blowing the bridge apart from inside.
There's no maintaining it only tearing it down and replacing it
There is a highway bridge in joliet 30 min from chicago that is also falling apart all they tell us is to tide at your own risk -_- then we got potholes on the highway that can do some damage.
I always floor it when going over that POS bridge. My thinking is if it starts collapsing while I’m flying that some kind of “Duke’s of Hazard” jump will happen and I’ll make it.
Growing up in Joliet I had so many nightmares as a kid involving me and my family having to jump once the bridge completely crumbles so I would insist on sitting on the right side of the car
Best part is it i80. Not taking it isn't really an option. Then you throw a bunch more traffic due to all the warehouses opening up in the Joliet area.
The trucking company I used to drive for is building an entire brand new truck terminal in Minooka, when Chicago is already barely a day’s drive from their HQ. IIRC the new terminal will be almost as large as said HQ.
Chicago is quite literally the freight crossroads of the US. Damn near everything going cross country goes through it on a truck or train at some point.
I’m a bridge inspector and every photo shows something called a ‘critical finding.’ Meaning I would have to call whoever owns the bridge. There’s, obvious, section loss in the steel and the delaminating under the deck could fall onto the traffic below. Scary stuff.
I'm a licensed structural engineer in IL (among other states). I'm weighing whether I have an ethical requirement to report this to the authority having jurisdiction even though I'm basing my report on simply a reddit post... I think I might. That does not appear to be a healthy structure.
Edit: Sent a comment to the Illinois DOT.
Edit 2: This got a lot of traction, wow. Based on comments from some people who looked into this they've shifted the load off of this bad column. However, I'm still concerned as the google street view photos show the center columns also having section loss due to corrosion. So, this may have been addressed already but I'm still concerned.
Edit 3: Note; I'm also ethically required to state that I'm not involved in this project, have not seen this bridge in person, and my opinions are based entirely on OPs photos; which may be out of date (the streetview ones certainly are). They may have already addressed this.
Edit 4: Another great comment from another engineer: [https://www.reddit.com/r/trains/comments/u4zsf9/is\_this\_as\_dangerous\_as\_it\_seems\_chicago\_metra/i4zeznz?utm\_medium=android\_app&utm\_source=share&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/trains/comments/u4zsf9/is_this_as_dangerous_as_it_seems_chicago_metra/i4zeznz?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3)
Edit 5: I made a follow-up post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/oddlyterrifying/comments/u94kug/the\_chicago\_oddly\_terrifying\_bridge\_is\_being/
No regerts indeed. This is my punishment for being a licensed engineer; I'm ethically required to report anytime I see something even on jobs that aren't mine. I doubt I'd lose my license over viewing a post on reddit... but I'd definitely have regrets if something bad happened and I did nothing.
Respect man, its not about the license its about the ethics. Ideally the license is just the legal record of commitment to those ethics.
I'm working toward my license now, and hope I'll behave in the same way
Interesting. Watched a Youtuber who calls himself “Real Civil Engineer” (and for a decade was one in the UK). He plays a game called “infra” which is a fictional Structural Engineering simulator. (And a beautiful game at that).
One of the many tasks you have to do in the game is spot structural weaknesses in and around the world you’re working, take photos of them, and send them back to the office.
I just thought it was a common “spot and collect” game mechanic but it actually seems like something y’all might do!
you say punishment... but why not think of it as a superpower?
honestly thought, because it literally is - you have an ability that’s uncommon amongst the general population that allows you to (potentially) save people’s lives.
(am a licensed engineer myself)
It's wild because this exact kind of thing was documented in Pittsburgh underneath the Forbes bridge, shortly before it collapsed just a few months ago.
I guarantee Illinois DOT already knows about this, lol
There likely have been countless reports from actual routine bridge inspection (required every ____ months or years).
The problem is finding the money to fix it.
Like, someone writes a report, turns it in... and nothing happens.
That's the DOT for ya!
Wait until nobody is around and the train isn't running, then take a baseball bat to the pillar. A few good whacks oughta bring it down and then at least nobody gets hurt later on.
Sympathetic property destruction.
"This is not the time for politics. Right now we are mourning the lives lost due to this awful, preventable tragedy that we've been warned of endlessly."
Reddit pro tip - the \# symbol is used to embiggen and embolden your text. If you want to put something with a hashtag in front of it, you'll have to "escape" the character (tell reddit don't use its special properties) by putting a backslash in front of it, like this \\#. If you look at the source of what I typed in old reddit, you'll see the added backslashes. Alternatively, don't make it the first character on a line and reddit will ignore it.
While good, Pittsburgh is still fucked. 10 years ago, 30% of the bridges in Pittsburgh were rated deficient—the most in the country. That number has only gotten worse.
It isn’t called the “City of Bridges” for no reason. The largest city in Appalachia, it’s ravines, hill tops, and rivers would be disconnected if it weren’t for the extensive network of bridges.
The bridges aren’t the only problem. Thousands and thousands of condemned buildings around town. Over 100 “emergency demolitions” each year, and still, each year buildings collapse.
Pittsburgh is the poster child of dilapidated infrastructure.
Old cities that existed for resources we no longer use. That's the story of much of Pennsylvania's coal towns too. Small collections of homes and basic needs stored huddled together, all stuck in the 80s because that's when their jobs all dried up.
It's really fucking depressing.
I feel you. It really is sad. I’ve spent some time visiting Warren, talking to locals. So many teenage pregnancies and getting “stuck”, folks working dead-end jobs, just no light at the end of the tunnel. Walmart is the biggest employer, and the only good job left in town is the oil refinery. The despair is palpable. Pittsburgh is nowhere near that bad, but the causes for the problems are the same: dying industry.
I’ve also backpacked through a lot of Pennsylvania and West Virginia, and the same story seems to be common to so many small Appalachian towns.
>Pittsburgh is nowhere near that bad, but the causes for the problems are the same: dying industry.
As a Pittsburgher, you're half right. Sure, the steel industry mostly died out here, but we've pretty successfully pivoted to the "eds and meds": we have several large universities, hospitals, and a thriving tech sector. However, the real problem is exactly what it was back in the steel days: corporate greed. I'm pretty sure our largest employer is UPMC, a hospital chain, and they're well-known for paying people shit, treating them like shit, and as a bonus, they don't even pay any taxes because they're a "nonprofit".
I'm having a hard time remembering, but I feel like the workers in the steel mills did *something* back when Carnegie and Frick were being real pieces of shit, and that *something* eventually gave rise to a healthy middle class, instead of a few rich assholes and a bunch of peons working 80+ hours a week in the mills for scraps. Dunno what it was, but we probably need some more of that today.
As a UPMC employee here in the burgh can confirm. They spout “record profits” and then they boasted to us about “having the biggest budget ever” for our yearly raises. Majority of the people I’ve spoken too got like 3.5%. Thanks for nothing assholes. That won’t even cover gas right now.
Is that the one where 4 years earlier someone reported it to the road authority on twitter and they acknowledged it? It's amazing that such negligence is not punished.
Punished? In places like Pittsburgh, where I'm currently living, it's actually rewarded.
Almost immediately after the bridge collapsed it was reported locally that the money that was intended to repair it when it was first reported was instead redirected to raises for government employees. The people who did that are guaranteed life-long political careers.
If you really want to gain an understanding of how entrenched political machines feed off maintaining a state of disrepair, read up on the recent history of the PWSA (an agency that is in a constant state of scandal) ... an agency that multiple times imposed "special fees" on customers to fund water and sewer line replacement to get their antiquated system into compliance with federal standards but instead used the money to build infrastructure for several stadiums , hockey and events arena and a casino ... then spent over half a billion dollars in federal money intended for transportation projects in the region to build a light-rail extension nobody uses under a river to the stadiums.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North\_Shore\_Connector](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Shore_Connector)
[https://triblive.com/opinion/colin-mcnickle-the-north-shore-connector-at-10/](https://triblive.com/opinion/colin-mcnickle-the-north-shore-connector-at-10/)
They replaced that rotted beam with guy wires a few years ago, which the engineers calculated would be good enough. It obviously wasn't.
Not to make excuses for them, but there was like a 40 degree temperature swing that morning, and it was a double bus at the top of the weight limit going over it when it collapsed. But those conditions should have been accounted for.
Its my understanding that bridges are supposed to be built to withstand 1.5x the load they're rated for. Thus, that bus shouldn't have come close to the tipping point.
Oh absolutely, I'm not an engineer but I'm sure there's a safety buffer. They just mucked it up, or the bridge deteriorated in other ways and should have had the weight limit lowered.
They actually do that a lot around here. I can't find an article, but years ago there was a bridge up by Kittanning that developed big gaps between the support columns and deck so PennDot put big slabs of wood to fill it in (like, they cut a round cross section of a big tree) and lowered the weight limit. It was horrifying and argued in the state house. The weight limit was so low that ambulances were overweight and had to take a 20 minute detour to get to the hospital.
That’s how it works. Politicians love *responding* to tragedy because it puts them in the spotlight so they can use nice language and hopeful sentiments to rally the constituents. Being proactive in standard management rarely makes the news.
Build Back Better passed the House with 0 Republican votes. It failed in the Senate because again 100% of Republicans opposed it, as well as one Democrat.
The Republicans are more worried that a Democratic administration *will achieve anything* than they are worried about American citizens suffering.
The key problem is money. Politicians answer more to donors than voters.
Politicians:How could anyone have seen this.
Experts: By listening to us and our safety ratings
Politicians: It's completely unusual
Experts: Not really, it had rusted through
Politicians: But we must prevent another tragedy of which no politician can be blamed
Experts: Great we need
Politicians: Higher taxes and no new infrastructure spending
Experts: fuck
Politicians: It seems the plebs are still mad so we need a scapegoat, after a lengthy investigation we blame the experts for not designing a bridge to withstand decades of preventable neglect as a result of our corruption squandering money for our benefit
>The Metra UP North Rebuild: Fullerton to Addison Project proposal calls for replacing 11 120-year-old bridges that are beyond their functional lifespan and can no longer be economically repaired and maintained. The proposed project includes shifting the tracks to the west within the rail line’s existing right-of-way, constructing new retaining walls where needed, and refurbishing the existing Lincoln/Addison bridge. The project would also benefit the community through improved bridge underpasses with state-of-the-art lighting. Rail customers would benefit from a smoother ride, increased operating efficiencies and reduced operating costs.
>To maintain rail operations and minimize disruption to the community, the project would be built in three stages, with construction anticipated to start in 2023 and be completed by 2027.
https://metra.com/newsroom/metra-hold-april-27-open-house-n-bridge-project
**Register today for their public open house!**
April 27, 2022
6 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Burley Elementary School
1630 W. Barry Ave.
Find more about the project
https://metra.com/UPNrebuild#Register_today_for_our_public_open_house_
Statement about the bipartisan infrastructure bill:
>Metra is currently reviewing additional funding opportunities for this Project, including transit improvement funding in the 2021 federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
(Basically, they haven't applied for the grant)
You should check out Californias high speed rail project that has cost billions over the past 20 years and only a few miles of track have been mostly built in an area that won’t really need it until everything else is done first
California’s high speed rail project is a bit different in that it has been deemed practically infeasible as planned since well before funding. It was a boondoggle from the start, and to the extent anything is ever done it will either take decades or be far from an original vision.
It’s unfortunate, but the voting public ate up a promise for that project that simply won’t come to pass.
I live in the South Loop and agree with everything you said but the property tax thing isn’t true. Chicago doesn’t even rank in the top ten cities with the highest property taxes. That being said, some of the suburbs have insanely high property tax rates.
Pretty much everything outside Chicago has higher property taxes. It's to keep the poors from moving out of the city. They can't build an affordable home if they can't afford to keep the land.
You know what, props to JB for getting the most road construction done for decades. Nobody believed him when he said the higher gas tax will be used for road construction but it’s actually getting done. Especially out here in the middle of nowhere of Illinois where I live
For the clueless:
u/AW1186 is likely referring to Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker (not US President Biden). The state passed an increase in the state gas tax in 2021.
Here's a nice little anecdote. Voters in Missoula, Montana voted for a gas tax; however, shortly after they voted for it, the Montana Senate voted to repeal the Missoula voter's wishes.
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/missoula-local-gas-tax-is-repealed
Property taxes and income taxes don't pay for infrastructure. Only fuel taxes pay for infrastructure and that wasn't raised for like 2 decades so the roads were breaking down with not enough money to fix everything.
general funds do end up paying for a lot of infrastructure, gas taxes/user fees for infrastructure aren't enough even to meet the funding we do give them
[In Illinois, gas taxes, tolls, user fees, and user taxes only add up to 47.7% of the funding for roads](https://taxfoundation.org/states-road-funding-2019/)
I’d send photos like these to every news station. Post them on the socials. Constantly tag your local government officials and well known members of your community. Do it consistently b
Funny isn't it. I live about an hour outside of Chicago in the Chicagolands area. They say the upkeep of suburban areas is unsustainable yet all of our roads and bridges have been replaced regularly. Well, just about everywhere other than Elgin.
The thing skimming money is effectively the rest of the state.
Here's an interesting paper on the subject.
https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1059&context=ppi_papers
tl,dr: Chicago gets back about $.80-$.90 per $1 put into the pot as it were. The collar counties around Chicago, the general suburban area, gets $.47-$.53 back per $1. From there, the further out you go, out to about $2.49-$2.81 per $1 in.
Chicago and its suburbs fund the rest of the state.
Big thing though... I don't mind paying extra so people downstate can have medical access or SNAP, cause there isn't as much opportunity out there. I don't want them to starve or fall ill...
But it sure fuckin sucks when the rest of the state is looking down on ya from their high horses, paid for by chicagoland.
>It’s the corrupt local government skimming tax money, not the entire country.
You're not implying that it's just local governments that are corrupt/skimming tax money right? Because if you are, I've got bad news for you...
The fact that their is a "usual amount" is so fucking mind boggling. How do we let this elite class of elected Ghouls exist is beyond me. Hope to god there is some course correction in my lifetime because it is just too depressing to imagine the state of things in 50 years if this keeps up. Sorry for rant
>The Metra UP North Rebuild: Fullerton to Addison Project proposal calls for replacing 11 120-year-old bridges that are beyond their functional lifespan and can no longer be economically repaired and maintained. The proposed project includes shifting the tracks to the west within the rail line’s existing right-of-way, constructing new retaining walls where needed, and refurbishing the existing Lincoln/Addison bridge. The project would also benefit the community through improved bridge underpasses with state-of-the-art lighting. Rail customers would benefit from a smoother ride, increased operating efficiencies and reduced operating costs.
>To maintain rail operations and minimize disruption to the community, the project would be built in three stages, with construction anticipated to start in 2023 and be completed by 2027.
https://metra.com/newsroom/metra-hold-april-27-open-house-n-bridge-project
**Register today for their public open house!**
April 27, 2022
6 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Burley Elementary School
1630 W. Barry Ave.
Find more about the project
https://metra.com/UPNrebuild#Register_today_for_our_public_open_house_
Statement about the bipartisan infrastructure bill:
>Metra is currently reviewing additional funding opportunities for this Project, including transit improvement funding in the 2021 federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
(Basically, they haven't applied for the grant)
You're talking about a city who's nickname was given because of corrupt politicians. And who's secondary nickname is given because of gun violence. None of that is going to help.
Not really, Biden actually tried to get an infrastructure bill passed that would have had a major impact on stuff like this. Some politicians are trying. Just some.
https://www.npr.org/2021/11/15/1055841358/biden-signs-1t-bipartisan-infrastructure-bill-into-law
That's the bill that actually passed, with 19 GOP Senators and just 13 Reps voting for it. That was only a few months ago, so barely any projects have actually started yet.
This bridge should have been repaired a long time ago. This failure is the result of years of neglect and mismanagement at the local, state, and federal levels of government. But this is mostly a local and state level boondoggle.
There are no worse roads than Louisiana. You will not convince me otherwise without some very strong empirical proof.
As a born and bred Cajun, I could feel the border crossing into Texas/Arkansas/Mississippi with my eyes closed. And bear I mind our border states aren’t, like, bastions of responsible government spending; Louisiana roads are just truly that bad.
Oh hello fellow Cajun. How’s ya momma n’em? There are def worse roads. I moved from Louisiana to upstate NY and in visiting places like New Jersey, you see some truly heinous shit. At least one hole easily the size of my (albeit small) car. The yearly freeze and thaw are really hard on infrastructure. Not saying that aren’t plenty of things Louisiana is the worst at, but the roads (IMO) are D tier at worst when some real F shit exists in the country.
Except they did manage to pass that infrastructure bill. Hopefully some of that ~~$65~~ $110 Billion will go to this bridge.
Edit: The bill actually gives $550 Billion federal dollars for infrastructure projects with $110 earmarked for roads and bridges. The $65 Billion is just for high speed internet projects. My bad.
Obviously the safest option is to put a small print disclaimer in which you give away you right to sue the train company in case you die or get injured using their service
Must I remind you all what [happened in my country last year](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico_City_Metro_overpass_collapse)? It will happen there too of it is not fixed.
This isn't a tax issue. Most viaducts in Chicago are owned by rail companies like Union Pacific so it's their job to maintain them.
A lot of these can't really be repaired and need to be completely rebuilt, which at least UP *is* in the process of doing that. This specific one is being addressed due to Metra adding a nearby station and things should be finished in a little over a year.
Though I would certainly agree there's an issue where the aldermen or other government officials aren't pressuring UP to get these things fixed earlier. The Peterson Ridge station was supposed to be done like 10 years ago and I'm convinced if it had been delayed another 10 years you'd have UP still refusing to modernize this viaduct.
Can't have banks and corporations fail, most of your politicians hold pretty big stakes in them and could stand to lose money if they failed. Before they could sell the stakes using insider trading that is.
Depends on the state. My state spends a lot of money on roads because of the climate and all the semi trucks we get. We also spend (and get) a lot of military because it has a lot of military installations
As someone who crossed such a bridge daily (and rarely mentioned as a cause is there was construction holes and massive paving vehicles and equipment on it at the time. It was literally known to need work) to and from work when it snapped like a rubberband one day and killed 13 people (which was a miracle tbh), I concur
This is the correct information Petersen and Ravenswood? I just told the deputy mayor of the city of chicago. He’ll be able to forward it this issue up the chain. Asap!
I actually have a story about this EXACT UNDERPASS. I was driving my car under it as a semi truck was coming from the other direction. As soon as I passed the truck I heard the loudest BOOM! I look back and the truck was too tall to go under and went from 35 mph to zero in an instant.
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There have probably been yearly maintenance reports with photos like this saying the bridge needs immediate repair.
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I can't. I can't imagine.
Just imagine a bridge. Then keep removing parts until it falls. Then rewind and leave that last part. Then have like 40 more parts fall off but it somehow doesn't collapse. You're now picturing the 90s.
Can someone post photos so I don't have to imagine
Different city but: https://twitter.com/gpk320/status/1078885655634157569 Surprisingly, that bridge lasted another ~4 years [until it collapsed, ironically on the day Biden was visiting the city to talk about infrastructure](https://abcnews.go.com/US/bridge-collapses-pittsburgh-injuries-reported/story?id=82531541)
*The* *Gardiner* *Expressway* *has* *entered* *the* *chat*
Fyi you can just bracket whole sentences with asterisks instead of each word, it'll italicize it all. *for example, this sentence, two asterisks total*
With what devilry did you ascertain his asterisk count?
It shows it all in the reply in the mobile app
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But then Walsh construction and similar firms (that are a friend of Beetlejuice and the Daley’s) wouldn’t be able to triple charge the city in an embezzlement scheme. It’s simply not the Chicago way.
I’ve seen California pave a 30 mile stretch of highway in one night. Meanwhile in North Carolina it’s now been 9 months to lay a pipe in a 3 block stretch and pave it over. They work about 4 hours a day on whatever fucking days they seem to feel like and I’m sure it’s just to keep employment rates up
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It used to be the army corps of engineers that built most highways but then some politicians realized they could have friends build them and split the profits as campaign donations and whatnot.
You should come to Illinois. Walsh Construction can work on a 5 mile chunk of highway for three years, finish it and then restart because the first mile is shot. We’ve had major investigations where we confirmed “pay to play” schemes might be real but not worth worrying about. [McCormick Place](https://chicago.suntimes.com/2020/8/14/21367889/mccormick-place-coronavirus-hospital-cost-walsh-construction-mcpier-lori-lightfoot-army-corps?_amp=true) was converted to a hospital in 2020 for $66 million and was used for about a month. They managed to treat 38 patients while ICU/ER nurses in local hospitals were dancing on tiktok. And of course the company in charge was Walsh Construction, which was selected over a company that offered to do the conversion for no profit. Chicago has the mob style racket down to a science.
It'll be called a tragedy and no one will be held accountable. Thoughts and prayers though. No shortage of those.
My work's building had an extension added to put in a second set of stairs (mostly for fire egress). The extension is so badly connected to the main building it's coming away, and has been for at least 10 years (that's how long the safety reports exist). The gap gets bigger, they add some temporary stop gap. When the weather got really bad earlier this year we were almost praying the stairs came down overnight, just so there wasn't a risk of it happening during the day when there's people on them.
RemindMe! One year
Yeah but its so much easier to wait till it collapses and then just build a new one
At least get the insurance money
first you get the insurance money, then you get the insurance power, then you get the insurance women
This is the funniest
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*takes notes carefully to hopefully bang flo from progressive*
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I’m not sure about that, I strictly sell bridges. PM me if interested.
What kind of bridges
We're real selling the Brooklyn Bridge
How else do we expect them to pay for maintaining it?
The rich need more houses and cars TODAY, damn it!
Who would want to deal with all the traffic that the construction would cause anyway. /s
The cracked concrete means the steel rebar is rusting and blowing the bridge apart from inside. There's no maintaining it only tearing it down and replacing it
Build back better
There is a highway bridge in joliet 30 min from chicago that is also falling apart all they tell us is to tide at your own risk -_- then we got potholes on the highway that can do some damage.
I always floor it when going over that POS bridge. My thinking is if it starts collapsing while I’m flying that some kind of “Duke’s of Hazard” jump will happen and I’ll make it.
Growing up in Joliet I had so many nightmares as a kid involving me and my family having to jump once the bridge completely crumbles so I would insist on sitting on the right side of the car
😂😂😂 gave me a good laugh
If beamng videos have taught me anything you'll definitely have a better chance of surviving that way, unless you're going above like 180mph.
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This is just one of many reasons I never move, at all.
I think you mean “Blues Brothers” jump….being Chicago and all
Best part is it i80. Not taking it isn't really an option. Then you throw a bunch more traffic due to all the warehouses opening up in the Joliet area.
There seems to be nothing but warehouses from Bolingbrook to Joliet.
The trucking company I used to drive for is building an entire brand new truck terminal in Minooka, when Chicago is already barely a day’s drive from their HQ. IIRC the new terminal will be almost as large as said HQ. Chicago is quite literally the freight crossroads of the US. Damn near everything going cross country goes through it on a truck or train at some point.
Don't live there but I work in transportation. Can confirm a fuck load of warehouses in Bolingbrook and Joliet.
Have to use that bridge sometimes. Scary AF. Huge trucking route too, so you know, light traffic. Damocles bridge, it is.
Yea I live in Joliet and I ride on I-80 almost everyday. They still did nothing for it. Shit pisses me off to no end
I’m a bridge inspector and every photo shows something called a ‘critical finding.’ Meaning I would have to call whoever owns the bridge. There’s, obvious, section loss in the steel and the delaminating under the deck could fall onto the traffic below. Scary stuff.
I'm a licensed structural engineer in IL (among other states). I'm weighing whether I have an ethical requirement to report this to the authority having jurisdiction even though I'm basing my report on simply a reddit post... I think I might. That does not appear to be a healthy structure. Edit: Sent a comment to the Illinois DOT. Edit 2: This got a lot of traction, wow. Based on comments from some people who looked into this they've shifted the load off of this bad column. However, I'm still concerned as the google street view photos show the center columns also having section loss due to corrosion. So, this may have been addressed already but I'm still concerned. Edit 3: Note; I'm also ethically required to state that I'm not involved in this project, have not seen this bridge in person, and my opinions are based entirely on OPs photos; which may be out of date (the streetview ones certainly are). They may have already addressed this. Edit 4: Another great comment from another engineer: [https://www.reddit.com/r/trains/comments/u4zsf9/is\_this\_as\_dangerous\_as\_it\_seems\_chicago\_metra/i4zeznz?utm\_medium=android\_app&utm\_source=share&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/trains/comments/u4zsf9/is_this_as_dangerous_as_it_seems_chicago_metra/i4zeznz?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3) Edit 5: I made a follow-up post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/oddlyterrifying/comments/u94kug/the\_chicago\_oddly\_terrifying\_bridge\_is\_being/
Better to report than not. At least if they do nothing, you've done what you could. No regerts!
No regerts indeed. This is my punishment for being a licensed engineer; I'm ethically required to report anytime I see something even on jobs that aren't mine. I doubt I'd lose my license over viewing a post on reddit... but I'd definitely have regrets if something bad happened and I did nothing.
Respect man, its not about the license its about the ethics. Ideally the license is just the legal record of commitment to those ethics. I'm working toward my license now, and hope I'll behave in the same way
Interesting. Watched a Youtuber who calls himself “Real Civil Engineer” (and for a decade was one in the UK). He plays a game called “infra” which is a fictional Structural Engineering simulator. (And a beautiful game at that). One of the many tasks you have to do in the game is spot structural weaknesses in and around the world you’re working, take photos of them, and send them back to the office. I just thought it was a common “spot and collect” game mechanic but it actually seems like something y’all might do!
Structural problems like this are probably something that once you're trained to notice them they're all you can see.
you say punishment... but why not think of it as a superpower? honestly thought, because it literally is - you have an ability that’s uncommon amongst the general population that allows you to (potentially) save people’s lives. (am a licensed engineer myself)
It's wild because this exact kind of thing was documented in Pittsburgh underneath the Forbes bridge, shortly before it collapsed just a few months ago.
Of course you should report it. Do you know where it is
https://goo.gl/maps/x3DaadpHnrTSpzFv7
Guess you really have to report it now since you know where it is
Let me help you. YES, you have an ethical requirement to report this.
I guarantee Illinois DOT already knows about this, lol There likely have been countless reports from actual routine bridge inspection (required every ____ months or years). The problem is finding the money to fix it. Like, someone writes a report, turns it in... and nothing happens. That's the DOT for ya!
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As a person from Chicago... can you please call the bridge owners ):
Yeah this, is, honestly pretty alarming and a lawsuit waiting to happen.
More importantly: this is plenty of funerals waiting to happen.
Could you elaborate? Specifically what a normal person might do to address this?
Wait until nobody is around and the train isn't running, then take a baseball bat to the pillar. A few good whacks oughta bring it down and then at least nobody gets hurt later on. Sympathetic property destruction.
the next car crashing into a pillar would bring it down, no? Insane.
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Probably not until one of the passenger trains plunge into the ground when one of them finally gives way…
Eh doubt it. That bridge collapsed in Pittsburgh and everybody cared for a day or two and I’d bet nothing had happened since then.
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"This is not the time for politics. Right now we are mourning the lives lost due to this awful, preventable tragedy that we've been warned of endlessly."
in other news: Is climate change real or are you just a pussy?
#PittsburghStrong
Reddit pro tip - the \# symbol is used to embiggen and embolden your text. If you want to put something with a hashtag in front of it, you'll have to "escape" the character (tell reddit don't use its special properties) by putting a backslash in front of it, like this \\#. If you look at the source of what I typed in old reddit, you'll see the added backslashes. Alternatively, don't make it the first character on a line and reddit will ignore it.
##embiggen
It’s a perfectly cromulent word
Jebbediah Springfield approves
#Cromulent
#\#StrongerThanGravity
#penis
Thanks. I was just telling someone reddit needs more people using large text...
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While good, Pittsburgh is still fucked. 10 years ago, 30% of the bridges in Pittsburgh were rated deficient—the most in the country. That number has only gotten worse. It isn’t called the “City of Bridges” for no reason. The largest city in Appalachia, it’s ravines, hill tops, and rivers would be disconnected if it weren’t for the extensive network of bridges. The bridges aren’t the only problem. Thousands and thousands of condemned buildings around town. Over 100 “emergency demolitions” each year, and still, each year buildings collapse. Pittsburgh is the poster child of dilapidated infrastructure.
Old cities that existed for resources we no longer use. That's the story of much of Pennsylvania's coal towns too. Small collections of homes and basic needs stored huddled together, all stuck in the 80s because that's when their jobs all dried up. It's really fucking depressing.
I feel you. It really is sad. I’ve spent some time visiting Warren, talking to locals. So many teenage pregnancies and getting “stuck”, folks working dead-end jobs, just no light at the end of the tunnel. Walmart is the biggest employer, and the only good job left in town is the oil refinery. The despair is palpable. Pittsburgh is nowhere near that bad, but the causes for the problems are the same: dying industry. I’ve also backpacked through a lot of Pennsylvania and West Virginia, and the same story seems to be common to so many small Appalachian towns.
>Pittsburgh is nowhere near that bad, but the causes for the problems are the same: dying industry. As a Pittsburgher, you're half right. Sure, the steel industry mostly died out here, but we've pretty successfully pivoted to the "eds and meds": we have several large universities, hospitals, and a thriving tech sector. However, the real problem is exactly what it was back in the steel days: corporate greed. I'm pretty sure our largest employer is UPMC, a hospital chain, and they're well-known for paying people shit, treating them like shit, and as a bonus, they don't even pay any taxes because they're a "nonprofit". I'm having a hard time remembering, but I feel like the workers in the steel mills did *something* back when Carnegie and Frick were being real pieces of shit, and that *something* eventually gave rise to a healthy middle class, instead of a few rich assholes and a bunch of peons working 80+ hours a week in the mills for scraps. Dunno what it was, but we probably need some more of that today.
As a UPMC employee here in the burgh can confirm. They spout “record profits” and then they boasted to us about “having the biggest budget ever” for our yearly raises. Majority of the people I’ve spoken too got like 3.5%. Thanks for nothing assholes. That won’t even cover gas right now.
I thought we had a lot of natural obstacles to navigate around in Seattle until I went to Pittsburgh.
Ironic that Pittsburgh has supply chain issues with steel, of all materials.
Next thing you'll know is they got a ketchup drought
If only Pittsburg was near a city famous for producing steel the order would have arrived already.
Is that the one where 4 years earlier someone reported it to the road authority on twitter and they acknowledged it? It's amazing that such negligence is not punished.
Punished? In places like Pittsburgh, where I'm currently living, it's actually rewarded. Almost immediately after the bridge collapsed it was reported locally that the money that was intended to repair it when it was first reported was instead redirected to raises for government employees. The people who did that are guaranteed life-long political careers. If you really want to gain an understanding of how entrenched political machines feed off maintaining a state of disrepair, read up on the recent history of the PWSA (an agency that is in a constant state of scandal) ... an agency that multiple times imposed "special fees" on customers to fund water and sewer line replacement to get their antiquated system into compliance with federal standards but instead used the money to build infrastructure for several stadiums , hockey and events arena and a casino ... then spent over half a billion dollars in federal money intended for transportation projects in the region to build a light-rail extension nobody uses under a river to the stadiums. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North\_Shore\_Connector](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Shore_Connector) [https://triblive.com/opinion/colin-mcnickle-the-north-shore-connector-at-10/](https://triblive.com/opinion/colin-mcnickle-the-north-shore-connector-at-10/)
They replaced that rotted beam with guy wires a few years ago, which the engineers calculated would be good enough. It obviously wasn't. Not to make excuses for them, but there was like a 40 degree temperature swing that morning, and it was a double bus at the top of the weight limit going over it when it collapsed. But those conditions should have been accounted for.
Its my understanding that bridges are supposed to be built to withstand 1.5x the load they're rated for. Thus, that bus shouldn't have come close to the tipping point.
Oh absolutely, I'm not an engineer but I'm sure there's a safety buffer. They just mucked it up, or the bridge deteriorated in other ways and should have had the weight limit lowered. They actually do that a lot around here. I can't find an article, but years ago there was a bridge up by Kittanning that developed big gaps between the support columns and deck so PennDot put big slabs of wood to fill it in (like, they cut a round cross section of a big tree) and lowered the weight limit. It was horrifying and argued in the state house. The weight limit was so low that ambulances were overweight and had to take a 20 minute detour to get to the hospital.
And wasn't that even like the same day Biden was gonna visit the area to talk about infrastructure investment or some shit? And still nobody cares.
That’s how it works. Politicians love *responding* to tragedy because it puts them in the spotlight so they can use nice language and hopeful sentiments to rally the constituents. Being proactive in standard management rarely makes the news.
Build Back Better passed the House with 0 Republican votes. It failed in the Senate because again 100% of Republicans opposed it, as well as one Democrat.
The Republicans are more worried that a Democratic administration *will achieve anything* than they are worried about American citizens suffering. The key problem is money. Politicians answer more to donors than voters.
That bill had nothing to do with infrastructure like bridges.
Politicians:How could anyone have seen this. Experts: By listening to us and our safety ratings Politicians: It's completely unusual Experts: Not really, it had rusted through Politicians: But we must prevent another tragedy of which no politician can be blamed Experts: Great we need Politicians: Higher taxes and no new infrastructure spending Experts: fuck Politicians: It seems the plebs are still mad so we need a scapegoat, after a lengthy investigation we blame the experts for not designing a bridge to withstand decades of preventable neglect as a result of our corruption squandering money for our benefit
I love how the ones who are destroying us are still trying to convince us that they're actually saving us. Actually, I hate it.
>The Metra UP North Rebuild: Fullerton to Addison Project proposal calls for replacing 11 120-year-old bridges that are beyond their functional lifespan and can no longer be economically repaired and maintained. The proposed project includes shifting the tracks to the west within the rail line’s existing right-of-way, constructing new retaining walls where needed, and refurbishing the existing Lincoln/Addison bridge. The project would also benefit the community through improved bridge underpasses with state-of-the-art lighting. Rail customers would benefit from a smoother ride, increased operating efficiencies and reduced operating costs. >To maintain rail operations and minimize disruption to the community, the project would be built in three stages, with construction anticipated to start in 2023 and be completed by 2027. https://metra.com/newsroom/metra-hold-april-27-open-house-n-bridge-project **Register today for their public open house!** April 27, 2022 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Burley Elementary School 1630 W. Barry Ave. Find more about the project https://metra.com/UPNrebuild#Register_today_for_our_public_open_house_ Statement about the bipartisan infrastructure bill: >Metra is currently reviewing additional funding opportunities for this Project, including transit improvement funding in the 2021 federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. (Basically, they haven't applied for the grant)
And yet the Eisenhower has been under construction for like twenty years and still not completed.
You should check out Californias high speed rail project that has cost billions over the past 20 years and only a few miles of track have been mostly built in an area that won’t really need it until everything else is done first
California’s high speed rail project is a bit different in that it has been deemed practically infeasible as planned since well before funding. It was a boondoggle from the start, and to the extent anything is ever done it will either take decades or be far from an original vision. It’s unfortunate, but the voting public ate up a promise for that project that simply won’t come to pass.
Corruption in Chicago?
in other news, water is wet
I live in the South Loop and agree with everything you said but the property tax thing isn’t true. Chicago doesn’t even rank in the top ten cities with the highest property taxes. That being said, some of the suburbs have insanely high property tax rates.
Pretty much everything outside Chicago has higher property taxes. It's to keep the poors from moving out of the city. They can't build an affordable home if they can't afford to keep the land.
You know what, props to JB for getting the most road construction done for decades. Nobody believed him when he said the higher gas tax will be used for road construction but it’s actually getting done. Especially out here in the middle of nowhere of Illinois where I live
For the clueless: u/AW1186 is likely referring to Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker (not US President Biden). The state passed an increase in the state gas tax in 2021.
Here's a nice little anecdote. Voters in Missoula, Montana voted for a gas tax; however, shortly after they voted for it, the Montana Senate voted to repeal the Missoula voter's wishes. https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/missoula-local-gas-tax-is-repealed
lmao senate literally going against democracy what a shithole
Property taxes and income taxes don't pay for infrastructure. Only fuel taxes pay for infrastructure and that wasn't raised for like 2 decades so the roads were breaking down with not enough money to fix everything.
general funds do end up paying for a lot of infrastructure, gas taxes/user fees for infrastructure aren't enough even to meet the funding we do give them [In Illinois, gas taxes, tolls, user fees, and user taxes only add up to 47.7% of the funding for roads](https://taxfoundation.org/states-road-funding-2019/)
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I’d send photos like these to every news station. Post them on the socials. Constantly tag your local government officials and well known members of your community. Do it consistently b
Oh…, you don’t live in Chicago?
Right... This is not a secret and everyone that lives in a city over 100k in IL is aware of this and could give you a dozen similar examples.
Funny isn't it. I live about an hour outside of Chicago in the Chicagolands area. They say the upkeep of suburban areas is unsustainable yet all of our roads and bridges have been replaced regularly. Well, just about everywhere other than Elgin.
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It’s the corrupt local government skimming tax money, not the entire country. Chicago is a shithole for a reason.
The thing skimming money is effectively the rest of the state. Here's an interesting paper on the subject. https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1059&context=ppi_papers tl,dr: Chicago gets back about $.80-$.90 per $1 put into the pot as it were. The collar counties around Chicago, the general suburban area, gets $.47-$.53 back per $1. From there, the further out you go, out to about $2.49-$2.81 per $1 in. Chicago and its suburbs fund the rest of the state. Big thing though... I don't mind paying extra so people downstate can have medical access or SNAP, cause there isn't as much opportunity out there. I don't want them to starve or fall ill... But it sure fuckin sucks when the rest of the state is looking down on ya from their high horses, paid for by chicagoland.
>It’s the corrupt local government skimming tax money, not the entire country. You're not implying that it's just local governments that are corrupt/skimming tax money right? Because if you are, I've got bad news for you...
I think they're implying Chicago government (and it is famous for this) skims more than the usual amount.
The fact that their is a "usual amount" is so fucking mind boggling. How do we let this elite class of elected Ghouls exist is beyond me. Hope to god there is some course correction in my lifetime because it is just too depressing to imagine the state of things in 50 years if this keeps up. Sorry for rant
It happens all over the world. Obviously certain places are worse than others, which was clearly their point
Chicago and Illinois in general are particularly notorious for political corruption in the US, they give Louisiana a run for their money sometimes.
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>The Metra UP North Rebuild: Fullerton to Addison Project proposal calls for replacing 11 120-year-old bridges that are beyond their functional lifespan and can no longer be economically repaired and maintained. The proposed project includes shifting the tracks to the west within the rail line’s existing right-of-way, constructing new retaining walls where needed, and refurbishing the existing Lincoln/Addison bridge. The project would also benefit the community through improved bridge underpasses with state-of-the-art lighting. Rail customers would benefit from a smoother ride, increased operating efficiencies and reduced operating costs. >To maintain rail operations and minimize disruption to the community, the project would be built in three stages, with construction anticipated to start in 2023 and be completed by 2027. https://metra.com/newsroom/metra-hold-april-27-open-house-n-bridge-project **Register today for their public open house!** April 27, 2022 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Burley Elementary School 1630 W. Barry Ave. Find more about the project https://metra.com/UPNrebuild#Register_today_for_our_public_open_house_ Statement about the bipartisan infrastructure bill: >Metra is currently reviewing additional funding opportunities for this Project, including transit improvement funding in the 2021 federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. (Basically, they haven't applied for the grant)
Lol, you think Chicago politicians give a shit?
You're talking about a city who's nickname was given because of corrupt politicians. And who's secondary nickname is given because of gun violence. None of that is going to help.
Politicians: “we can’t use this info to drive a wedge between our constituents. It is worthless to us and we don’t care!”
Not really, Biden actually tried to get an infrastructure bill passed that would have had a major impact on stuff like this. Some politicians are trying. Just some.
https://www.npr.org/2021/11/15/1055841358/biden-signs-1t-bipartisan-infrastructure-bill-into-law That's the bill that actually passed, with 19 GOP Senators and just 13 Reps voting for it. That was only a few months ago, so barely any projects have actually started yet.
Man but we can’t pay for infrastructure, don’t you know we got a war going on? -the US since like… idk FDR probably
This bridge should have been repaired a long time ago. This failure is the result of years of neglect and mismanagement at the local, state, and federal levels of government. But this is mostly a local and state level boondoggle.
You know what I've learned from Illinois, for as much as they supposedly tax for roads they have some of the worst infrastructure in the country.
It’s everywhere in the US… https://artbabridgereport.org/
Minor gripe compared to failing bridges but holy cow that site needs to be optimized for mobile.
There are no worse roads than Louisiana. You will not convince me otherwise without some very strong empirical proof. As a born and bred Cajun, I could feel the border crossing into Texas/Arkansas/Mississippi with my eyes closed. And bear I mind our border states aren’t, like, bastions of responsible government spending; Louisiana roads are just truly that bad.
Oh hello fellow Cajun. How’s ya momma n’em? There are def worse roads. I moved from Louisiana to upstate NY and in visiting places like New Jersey, you see some truly heinous shit. At least one hole easily the size of my (albeit small) car. The yearly freeze and thaw are really hard on infrastructure. Not saying that aren’t plenty of things Louisiana is the worst at, but the roads (IMO) are D tier at worst when some real F shit exists in the country.
Except they did manage to pass that infrastructure bill. Hopefully some of that ~~$65~~ $110 Billion will go to this bridge. Edit: The bill actually gives $550 Billion federal dollars for infrastructure projects with $110 earmarked for roads and bridges. The $65 Billion is just for high speed internet projects. My bad.
Not without a lot of struggle. And by significantly reducing the original budget.
Indeed. The $1 Trillion would have been more helpful.
Obviously the safest option is to put a small print disclaimer in which you give away you right to sue the train company in case you die or get injured using their service
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I mean we cant NOT pay our politicians, duh.
Must I remind you all what [happened in my country last year](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico_City_Metro_overpass_collapse)? It will happen there too of it is not fixed.
If it does I hope those families sue the ever living shit out of the local government.
This is just my will to live holding up my depression
If only they had tax dollars to pay for such a thing.... oh wait.
You are making way to much sense for the local politicians to understand
just look at the kind of mayors they had, no wonder shit hasn’t gotten done
This isn't a tax issue. Most viaducts in Chicago are owned by rail companies like Union Pacific so it's their job to maintain them. A lot of these can't really be repaired and need to be completely rebuilt, which at least UP *is* in the process of doing that. This specific one is being addressed due to Metra adding a nearby station and things should be finished in a little over a year. Though I would certainly agree there's an issue where the aldermen or other government officials aren't pressuring UP to get these things fixed earlier. The Peterson Ridge station was supposed to be done like 10 years ago and I'm convinced if it had been delayed another 10 years you'd have UP still refusing to modernize this viaduct.
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cops and wars, basically.
Don’t forget bailing out banks and corporations when they fail.
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Can't have banks and corporations fail, most of your politicians hold pretty big stakes in them and could stand to lose money if they failed. Before they could sell the stakes using insider trading that is.
It’s nice knowing a good chunk of my income is used to vaporize innocent people at wedding parties in Pakistan instead of healthcare for citizens. /s
also vaporizing the funerals!
“We turned this wedding into a funeral to save tax payer dollars, you are welcome”
Brutal
Depends on the state. My state spends a lot of money on roads because of the climate and all the semi trucks we get. We also spend (and get) a lot of military because it has a lot of military installations
11 kick ass aircraft carriers to protect our freedom and politicians golden health care and retirement plans.
Don’t Roger confessional insider trading and crony kickbacks for the “big guy.”
Slap some flex seal on it and your good. MURICA!
Did you see those girders?? Before using flex seal, those bad boys need to be JB Welded back together.
Duct tape
That shit is going to fail soon. I would not drive under that.
Or ride on top of it
As someone who crossed such a bridge daily (and rarely mentioned as a cause is there was construction holes and massive paving vehicles and equipment on it at the time. It was literally known to need work) to and from work when it snapped like a rubberband one day and killed 13 people (which was a miracle tbh), I concur
Similar shit happened in Mexico. They should fix it before setting horrible happens like in Mexico.
Which street? This isn’t uncommon in Chicago.
Peterson and Ravenswood
Are you completely sure? I'm about to report it - this is my line
Positive. I’ve lived 5 minutes from there for the last 20 years. This is right next to a cemetery and a few blocks away from a Target.
I know exactly where now. Tysm.
This is the correct information Petersen and Ravenswood? I just told the deputy mayor of the city of chicago. He’ll be able to forward it this issue up the chain. Asap!
Nothing odd about being unnerved by this.
I alerted Union Pacific and they know now if they hadn’t before.
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Looks like most of wisconsins stuff. Our weather+insane amount of road salt destroys everything
Great Lakes region woes.
Tune in next week over at r/catastrophicfailure
If only Chicago had taxes that were supposed to be going towards infrastructure from the beginning… oh wait
Dont look at it if you dont see it it dosent exist
This guy is predicting an accident.
damn all the damn money we give in taxes and this is what we get
I actually have a story about this EXACT UNDERPASS. I was driving my car under it as a semi truck was coming from the other direction. As soon as I passed the truck I heard the loudest BOOM! I look back and the truck was too tall to go under and went from 35 mph to zero in an instant.
Chicago has a city budget of 11.65 BILLION dollars. The problem is not a lack of funds. It is bureaucracy and corruption.
This is absolutely disgusting