Why, you ask?
Reacting to President Barack Obama’s statement last week that there were 153 “structurally deficient†bridges in North Carolina and that the government should not wait “until another bridge falls†to take action, Sen. Kay Hagan (D.-N.C.) insisted there are no bridges in her state in danger of falling.
“No, no there are not any bridges in North Carolina in danger of falling,†Hagan said when CNSNews.com asked her about Obama’s statement about North Carolina’s “structurally deficient†bridges.
She soften the rebuke up by saying that infrastructure spending was needed. If only we had passed some sort of legislation that would take care of these shovel ready jobs.
In a Sept. 14 speech in North Carolina pitching his new $447 billion jobs plan, Obama said: “In North Carolina alone, there are 153 structurally deficient bridges that need to be repaired. Four of them are near here, on or around the Beltline. Why would we wait to act until another bridge falls?â€
The North Carolina Department of Transportation later told CNSNews.com said it does not know where Obama came up with the claim that there are 153 “structurally deficient†bridges in the state, and insisted that all open bridges in the state are in fact safe.
Of course, as CNS News finds out, it’s more like 2,696 out of 12,712. You’d think he would’ve used the higher number. Perhaps he was thinking of the structurally deficient bridges in the 57th state?
Anyhow, “structurally deficient” doesn’t mean they are going to collapse. Quite often, it simply means that there is way more weight from traffic than was originally intended. One of the bridges Obama was probably referring to during his speech in Raleigh, where the talking point came from, is on the 440 beltline crossing over Hillsborough St. The 2 lane each way bridge carries an enormous amount of traffic, a lot more than was ever intended, as a big wig with the NCDOT told me not more than 6 months ago. It is heavily used for a variety of reasons, such as being sort of near downtown, near NCSU, Meredith College, near the RBC Center (where the Carolina Hurricanes play), near Carter-Finley stadium (where the NCSU Wolfpack play), a way to get to I-40, and so on. But, the bridge is actually fine.
Anyhow, I bet Kay is going to get an ugly call from the Obama admin.
Via Doug Powers at Michelle Malkin.
That whole stretch of the Beltline is a bottleneck if you your leaving Carter-Finley during the work week it’s congested all the way until you get on the exit to the 440/40 beltline. When I was making that commute to the stadium everyday even at six in the morning traffic was congested heading towards the mall. I’ve always wonder why that one stretch of the Beltline was only two lanes.
Initially, the beltline from the Ridge Rd overpass (near Glenwood) was 2 lanes all the way heading West, but they expanded it to 3 lanes till you get to the Wade avenue exit. They would have to take over major land and deal with major bridges to widen. But, the population out that way wasn’t that large back in the mid 90’s, and no RBC Center.
Ummm… every bridge built over 30 years ago is structurally deficient.
But, thankfully, due to the shovel-ready-construction jobs stimulus TARP highway-repair bridge construction fixing program enacted over the last few decades and in 2009 with the near $1 Trillion debt-reduction plan,…..
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all our bridges belong to us