England
 

It seems we aren't the only ones with infrastructure problems.

Attachment 71502

Hammersmith Bridge over the River Thames is a 132 year old, cast iron, wood decked, bridge with some cracks that worry the powers that be.
It was shut to car traffic 17 months ago and to pedestrians, cyclists and river traffic in August when the cracks widened in the hot weather.
17,000 people, including 4,000 schoolchildren, once walked across the bridge daily.

The council, which owns the bridge, says it will cost £141 million for a full repair but £46 million to be able to reopen it safely to pedestrians.
The authority and Transport for London say they don’t have the money.

The nearest road bridge is nearly four miles away. School kids who once walked 10 minutes over the bridge to school now cycle 45 minutes, first along a busy road, dragging heavy bikes and bags (school lockers are banned because of Covid) up and down steep steps at Barnes railway bridge, then cross a park where last year there were 35 arrests for violence and sexual offences and 105 for antisocial behavior. The river towpath is often flooded, meaning they must bike alongside the six-lane A4.

Forget public transport — TfL’s provided three buses an hour, carrying only 14 passengers to allow for distancing. A car trip in the perpetual gridlock also takes 90 minutes, impossible for parents also trying to get to work.

People are frustrated, angry, and disgusted, businesses are dying, and nothing is getting done. Sounds like here to me.

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/lond...-a4546791.html

https://www.bridgeweb.com/Growing-cr...th-Bridge/7352

https://www.standard.co.uk/comment/c...-a4544466.html

That's a clunky looking suspension cable.
Just give the kids life preservers.
Both those "standard" links froze my computer.

They're not cables, this is just 4 years after the Brooklyn Bride was completed, all cast iron and wrought iron with a wood deck.

It's not clear from the pictures in the article where the cracks were found. The article only showed one crack that had grown. How many cracks are there? Obviously, I'm sitting over here thousands of miles away with virtually no good information, and they are engineers on the site actually examining the damage. But it looks like most of those individual cast iron parts bolted together could be easily swapped out individually and replaced with steel parts.

That's the beauty of a bolted together thing. You can unbolt it and replace.

/ignorant rant

"....all cast iron and wrought iron with a wood deck."

That's what I said: clunky.

But it was clunking along for 132 years, you and I won't.

Here's the oldest...

Cast iron goes better arched than suspended.
I've seen River Severn; sorry I missed this beauty.