I wonder if there will be any structural damage from this fire. The video looked pretty gnarly...

 

I think @jmecklenborg has suggested before, if we just removed the existing bridge and built a new one in its place, it could be done very quickly (see: I-35W bridge).

On 7/15/2020 at 9:55 AM, thomasbw said:

Brent Spence Bridge traffic is lower in 2019 than in 2005. Spending $3.5 billion on a new span parallel to the existing bridge (they're not replacing the current bridge) and charging a $1 toll will decrease BSB traffic by 25% and gridlock every other bridge across the river.

 

All data ODOT- https://odot.ms2soft.com/tcds/tsearch.asp?loc=odot

All graphs ODOT- https://www.brentspencebridgecorridor.com/documents/

The clay wade bailey bridge is just such a pain to use and quite inconveinient. It does not efficiently line up with the Cincinnati Street grid, and Covington has grown and developed more to the East along the suspension bridge route so that when it dumps into Covington, it is not a great route there either. It would have been much better if they were able to design it to a Race street alignment into Covington, but I believe that woudl have gone through the IRS site at that time.

39 minutes ago, taestell said:

I wonder if there will be any structural damage from this fire. The video looked pretty gnarly...

 

I think @jmecklenborg has suggested before, if we just removed the existing bridge and built a new one in its place, it could be done very quickly (see: I-35W bridge).

 

Sure... but let's make sure we get rush hour traffic off it before we take it down. 

 

37 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

. It would have been much better if they were able to design it to a Race street alignment into Covington, but I believe that woudl have gone through the IRS site at that time.

 

The Clay Wade Bailey Bridge is built on the piers of the original C&O railroad bridge, which is why it crosses the river at a random spot and at a slightly crooked angle.  

 

A Race-Madison bridge was completely funded by Ohio and Kentucky in the early 1990s but that money was diverted to build the new Maysville bridge.  I was worried that the new music venue at The Banks was going to block the foot of Race St. but it doesn't.  For a long time I've advocated here for a crossing at that point.  Something like The Taylor Southgate Bridge would be very cheap to build.

 

There is also the potential to build an approach to a new bridge from Race at 4th St. that would travel over The Banks just like the Dixie Terminal ramps used to.  This would allow TANK buses to bypass those intersections.  

 

It's probably been discussed but would a tunnel be cheaper than a replacement bridge? You could maybe build the north opening somewhere around the 8th street viaduct and the south portal near the 5th street interchange. This would allow both Cincinnati and Covington to tear down a lot of expensive flyover viaducts and open up some land for redevelopment. Trucks carrying hazardous/explosive materials can be rerouted along 275.

 

 

1 hour ago, JaceTheAce41 said:

It's probably been discussed but would a tunnel be cheaper than a replacement bridge? You could maybe build the north opening somewhere around the 8th street viaduct and the south portal near the 5th street interchange. This would allow both Cincinnati and Covington to tear down a lot of expensive flyover viaducts and open up some land for redevelopment. Trucks carrying hazardous/explosive materials can be rerouted along 275.

 

A tunnel would be amazing but probably significantly more expensive than the current plan to build a second bridge.

 

Here's a graphic @jmecklenborgcreated:

 

 

3 hours ago, jwulsin said:

 

Sure... but let's make sure we get rush hour traffic off it before we take it down. 

 

At his point I'm more worried about permanent structural damage to the Roebling than to the Brent Spence:

https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2020/11/11/despite-11-ton-restriction-semis-using-roebling-during-brent-spence-closure/6253467002/

 

Edited November 11, 20204 yr by ucgrady

2 hours ago, JaceTheAce41 said:

It's probably been discussed but would a tunnel be cheaper than a replacement bridge? You could maybe build the north opening somewhere around the 8th street viaduct and the south portal near the 5th street interchange. This would allow both Cincinnati and Covington to tear down a lot of expensive flyover viaducts and open up some land for redevelopment. Trucks carrying hazardous/explosive materials can be rerouted along 275.

 

 

Digging a tunnel would be enormously expensive, its not even remotely an option. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was briefly looked at but certainly dismissed due to cost and scale.

Edited November 11, 20204 yr by 646empire

We need a West Side bridge to CVG airport to add redundancy to the network.

13 minutes ago, thebillshark said:

We need a West Side bridge to CVG airport to add redundancy to the network.

Hasn't this been discussed as being way too high? Plus there isn't a really large capacity road to connect it to is there? 

They need cops at either end of the suspension bridge keeping trucks off the thing.  Not sure why simple stuff is so complicated in this town.  

5 minutes ago, JaceTheAce41 said:

Hasn't this been discussed as being way too high? Plus there isn't a really large capacity road to connect it to is there? 

Perhaps have a “high bridge” from Neeb Rd to Terminal Drive. On the Ohio side build a connector eastwards down the hillside to US-50. That would be the large capacity road with quick access to downtown. On the Kentucky side of course there would be access to I-275. 

7 hours ago, ucgrady said:

At his point I'm more worried about permanent structural damage to the Roebling than to the Brent Spence:

https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2020/11/11/despite-11-ton-restriction-semis-using-roebling-during-brent-spence-closure/6253467002/

 

 

The Roebling Bridge has now been closed because of the high number of weight limit violations.

They need to keep the Roebling open to only the Southbank Shuttle and run "express shuttles" from the Covington Transit Center to Government Square 

If ODOT District 8 Construction Engineer Doug Riddiough is correct here, Brent Spence Bridge traffic is lower now than it was 35 years ago. From 1985. Keep in mind the only reason the bridge is unsafe is because the Kentucky Department of Transportation deliberately chose to make it unsafe in 1985 when they removed the shoulders to increase capacity.

 

This region truly needs 3 additional new bridges aside from the BS replacement span.   

A Westside connection near the ferry, Race/Madison connection, and Eastside connection near Columbia/Dayton KY would be super helpful at this moment in time.

Edited November 12, 20204 yr by oakiehigh

^The small bridges really aren't that expensive - like well under $100 million for a new 2-lane bridge.  The connections to local streets on either side might cost more than the bridge itself. 

 

 

^Even more of a reason we (powers that be) should be pushing those options.

Since the U.S. is in full conspiracy theory season, what if those two truck drivers were paid to crash and burn down the Brent Spence? Middle of the night, no one hurt, big fire... sounds like a tax fraud scheme to me. 

^Pay closer attention to the next semi you find yourself next to on the interstate.   Unfortunately, I drive these routes daily.   I can't even keep count on a daily basis the amount of times I am cut off by an erratically driven semi or one passes me in the next lane while I'm cruising 75 to 80 mph.    

 

The bulk of semi drivers we get at my work are usually Eastern European or Middle Eastern decent who do not speak English.   

While I'm not one who goes around saying you need to speak English to move or live here, I'd prefer the truck drivers in this country who traverse our roads driving an 80,000+ lbs projectile at very least be able to read our road signs.   

Edited November 12, 20204 yr by oakiehigh

2 hours ago, thomasbw said:

They need to keep the Roebling open to only the Southbank Shuttle and run "express shuttles" from the Covington Transit Center to Government Square 

 

The minute I heard that the Southbank Shuttle was being detoured because the Roebling Bridge was closed, I wondered, why don't they just leave the bridge open for transit only? The completely lack of creativity in this region when it comes to transportation continues to astound me.

 

1 hour ago, thomasbw said:

Keep in mind the only reason the bridge is unsafe is because the Kentucky Department of Transportation deliberately chose to make it unsafe in 1985 when they removed the shoulders to increase capacity.

 

Why in the world do we allow bridges to be re-striped to remove the emergency shoulders? That would be like the owner of an apartment building saying, "I want to fit a few more units in my building. I'm going to remove one of the emergency staircases and squeeze in one additional studio apartment on each floor." We would never allow that to happen because it would remove one of the means of egress and make the building unsafe. But we allowed it for both the Brent Spence Bridge and the Big Mac Bridge.

1 hour ago, oakiehigh said:

This region truly needs 3 additional new bridges aside from the BS replacement span.   

A Westside connection near the ferry, Race/Madison connection, and Eastside connection near Columbia/Dayton KY would be super helpful at this moment in time.

 

I hear stuff like this a lot, but where is the data to support it? I came here from Philly, which is a much bigger city with fewer bridges. It is incredibly easy to get from Cincinnati to Covington or Newport. The Taylor Southgate Bridge looks like a ghost town 23 hours per day. This morning I looked at Google Maps expecting traffic to be a clusterf*ck because of the BSB closing and guess what? It wasn't that bad! I don't think there is actually any data out there to support the need for new bridges. We could restripe the BSB to go back to its intended configuration, slap on a new coat of paint, and we'd be good for decades. The bridge is not structurally deficient. 

5 minutes ago, oakiehigh said:

 

The bulk of semi drivers we get at my work are usually Eastern European or Middle Eastern decent who do not speak English.   

While I'm not one who goes around saying you need to speak English to move or live here, I'd prefer the truck drivers in this country who traverse our roads driving an 80,000+ lbs projectile at very least be able to read our road signs.   

 

You don't really need to speak English to read road signs though. I am far from fluent in Spanish but have been able to get around Spanish-speaking countries just find. My grandfather was a coal miner from Eastern Kentucky who couldn't read up until the day he died, but he drove just fine. Highway signs have recognizable symbols and basic words. They're not novels. 

15 minutes ago, DEPACincy said:

 

I hear stuff like this a lot, but where is the data to support it? I came here from Philly, which is a much bigger city with fewer bridges. It is incredibly easy to get from Cincinnati to Covington or Newport. The Taylor Southgate Bridge looks like a ghost town 23 hours per day. This morning I looked at Google Maps expecting traffic to be a clusterf*ck because of the BSB closing and guess what? It wasn't that bad! I don't think there is actually any data out there to support the need for new bridges. We could restripe the BSB to go back to its intended configuration, slap on a new coat of paint, and we'd be good for decades. The bridge is not structurally deficient. 

The one exception to me is a Westside/airport bridge. If Philadelphia's airport was in New Jersey and you had to choose to drive extra miles across the Whitman or Commodore bridge wouldn't you just put a bridge right at the airport? It's also not just about commute times, this would be an economic driver for the Westside to connect to the airport and all it's associated warehouses. 

 

Also I live in NKY and I-75/71 are being routed around the 275 loop, but with 75 closed between Florence and the river, getting from Ft.Mitchell to Cincinnati today took 30+ minutes instead of a normal 10 minute commute. Maybe not a nightmare, but also if I wanted a 30 minute commute I would live in West Chester, and I don't want either of those things. 

Edited November 12, 20204 yr by ucgrady

A west side airport bridge and an east side Dayton, KY-to-Columbia Tusculum bridge would add new connectivity to the region that doesn't currently exist and unlock a lot of economic development potential on both sides of the river. I'm less convinced that we need another downtown bridge unless it would be a transit-only bridge like the Tilikum Crossing.

10 minutes ago, ucgrady said:

The one exception to me is a Westside/airport bridge. If Philadelphia's airport was in New Jersey and you had to choose to drive extra miles across the Whitman or Commodore bridge wouldn't you just put a bridge right at the airport? It's also not just about commute times, this would be an economic driver for the Westside to connect to the airport and all it's associated warehouses. 

 

Also I live in NKY and I-75/71 are being routed around the 275 loop, but with 75 closed between Florence and the river, getting from Ft.Mitchell to Cincinnati today took 30+ minutes instead of a normal 10 minute commute. Maybe not a nightmare, but also if I wanted a 30 minute commute I would live in West Chester, and I don't want either of those things. 

 

I hear you. And I think a West Side bridge makes way more sense than another downtown bridge. I'm not sure that would help your situation today though. From Ft. Mitchell to Downtown via a West Side bridge would probably take just as long, especially with it absorbing a lot of I-75 traffic.

3 minutes ago, taestell said:

A west side airport bridge and an east side Dayton, KY-to-Columbia Tusculum bridge would add new connectivity to the region that doesn't currently exist and unlock a lot of economic development potential on both sides of the river. I'm less convinced that we need another downtown bridge unless it would be a transit-only bridge like the Tilikum Crossing.

 

For the east side bridge to pay for itself we'd need to drastically change the zoning in Dayton, CT, Mt. Lookout, etc. to allow a lot more development there. Would the residents of those places go for that? 

33 minutes ago, DEPACincy said:

 

I hear stuff like this a lot, but where is the data to support it? I came here from Philly, which is a much bigger city with fewer bridges. It is incredibly easy to get from Cincinnati to Covington or Newport. The Taylor Southgate Bridge looks like a ghost town 23 hours per day. This morning I looked at Google Maps expecting traffic to be a clusterf*ck because of the BSB closing and guess what? It wasn't that bad! I don't think there is actually any data out there to support the need for new bridges. We could restripe the BSB to go back to its intended configuration, slap on a new coat of paint, and we'd be good for decades. The bridge is not structurally deficient. 

Keep in mind, still alot of people working from home.    How many more who had gone back to work pivoted and stayed home to work?   I imagine thier is a large portion of the population here that is able to remote in at moments notice due to Covid or random perils such as this incident.  

 

I agree traffic wasn't as bad as I expected.   Hell, traffic has been worse the past 4-5 months when 75 was down to two lanes each direction as opposed to being shutdown altogether.

7 minutes ago, DEPACincy said:

 

For the east side bridge to pay for itself we'd need to drastically change the zoning in Dayton, CT, Mt. Lookout, etc. to allow a lot more development there. Would the residents of those places go for that? 

Where would this connect on the KY side? It's all blocked by low-density SFH and you ain't gonna buy those people out. How ridiculous are the ramps going to be on both sides to integrate the bridge into the existing roads? The whole idea would be great 80 years ago but it's DOA now.

13 minutes ago, DEPACincy said:

 

I hear you. And I think a West Side bridge makes way more sense than another downtown bridge. I'm not sure that would help your situation today though. From Ft. Mitchell to Downtown via a West Side bridge would probably take just as long, especially with it absorbing a lot of I-75 traffic.

A West Side bridge might keep the Boone County, Villa Hills, Erlanger etc. people off of Dixie Highway and the Clay Wade, but yes I'm not suggesting that bridge should be built to help me, it should be built to help the West Side and airport. 

 

On the topic of Brent Spence bridge, if it is found that there are structural issues I honestly would hope they just replace the current bridge instead of building a new adjacent bridge. If i have to choose between demolishing a 100' of Longworth Hall for an adjacent bridge and demolishing the current Brent Spence, that's an easy choice. I'll just have a sh*tty commute for a year and a half but it would be worth it for a true replacement bridge with 4 lanes each way and emergency shoulders. 

3 minutes ago, ucgrady said:

A West Side bridge might keep the Boone County, Villa Hills, Erlanger etc. people off of Dixie Highway and the Clay Wade, but yes I'm not suggesting that bridge should be built to help me, it should be built to help the West Side and airport. 

 

 

There's also the issue of inducing sprawl in Boone County. Would we spur development? Or would we just be shuffling the deck? I think it might be the latter. 

 

3 minutes ago, ucgrady said:

On the topic of Brent Spence bridge, if it is found that there are structural issues I honestly would hope they just replace the current bridge instead of building a new adjacent bridge. If i have to choose between demolishing a 100' of Longworth Hall for an adjacent bridge and demolishing the current Brent Spence, that's an easy choice. I'll just have a sh*tty commute for a year and a half but it would be worth it for a true replacement bridge with 4 lanes each way and emergency shoulders. 

 

I agree with you, but I would bet my life savings this won't happen. If anything moves forward, it'll be the new adjacent bridge. The replacement option would require years of new studies and there would be uproar about having I-75 disrupted for so long.

16 hours ago, jmecklenborg said:

They need cops at either end of the suspension bridge keeping trucks off the thing.  Not sure why simple stuff is so complicated in this town.  

 

Cranley probably wants to make a spectacle out of the whole thing.

22 minutes ago, DEPACincy said:

If anything moves forward, it'll be the new adjacent bridge. The replacement option would require years of new studies and there would be uproar about having I-75 disrupted for so long.

As Travis mentioned up thread, I-35 in Minneapolis was replaced in 14 months. Granted that's a much shorter span, but when a fire is lit under people and is deemed an emergency replacement, it happens much quicker. Plus all the ramps and spaghetti could remain as-is, and you wouldn't have to phase the construction to allow for continuing traffic allowing things to progress much faster. 

 

If I were czar of everything, I would renovate the current BSB in place, but allowing three lanes of I75 instead of two across it (only connect one lane from FWW), on the other side of town, extend 3 lanes of 71 to 471 (again letting only one lane to FWW) and let the 71/75 combination happen in NKY while re-working the ramps at the current 471/275 and 275/75 interchanges. There is way more room to work with down there, and you could add lanes to existing ramp configurations instead of building a new bridge. This would be much cheaper than a new bridge and prevent the real issue which is 71/75 coming together in downtown and immediately going up the cut-in-the-hill. If KY wants to pay more they could decide to extend 71 south of 275 to Richwood so that the two highways never share space and simply cross each other in Boone County. 

If I was czar of everything, I'd do a cut and cover tunnel to replace the BSB and cover FWW to allow more dense development on top. I'd then build a couple two-lane bridges to connect Cincy and NKY along the Banks and let the region act as a single unit for once rather than this weird two-state mindset. Hell, if I could wave a magic wand, I'd have a multi-state regional transit and roads authority who'd handle infrastructure like this rather than the balkanized system we currently have.

How is cut and cover done under water?

So, which one of you guys is going to take one for the team and finish the job with the Brent Spence so we can just get a new bridge.

For the river section it would basically be a box that sits in a dredged out portion of the river bed. Dredge a trench, sink a box, pump the water out. The river has to stay at a minimum depth of 20 ft or something like that for shipping and that can be controlled via dams. If you absolutely needed to you could build a coffer dam system to build the tunnel in the river without impeding traffic too much.

DeWine is on talk radio hinting that the BSB may be closed for 60-90 days.

2 hours ago, GCrites80s said:

 

Cranley probably wants to make a spectacle out of the whole thing.

 

How many big churches have a police officer (or multiple) show up to direct traffic?  Not that complicated.  

 

 

 

12 minutes ago, jmecklenborg said:

 

How many big churches have a police officer (or multiple) show up to direct traffic?  Not that complicated.  

 

 

 

or police in front of downtown parking garages every single day

2 hours ago, ucgrady said:

As Travis mentioned up thread, I-35 in Minneapolis was replaced in 14 months. Granted that's a much shorter span, but when a fire is lit under people and is deemed an emergency replacement, it happens much quicker. Plus all the ramps and spaghetti could remain as-is, and you wouldn't have to phase the construction to allow for continuing traffic allowing things to progress much faster.

 

I think the best case scenario would be if they determined that the current bridge was too damaged to reopen. The current bridge could be removed and a new slightly larger (and more attractive) bridge rebuilt in its place. The process might take 2 years to complete. There is no "good" time for something like this to happen, but with many people working from home for the foreseeable future, it'll be OK. Make the Roebling Bridge transit-only during construction and use some of the cost savings to fund frequent express buses using the Roebling and CWB bridges.

 

That sounds much more appealing than 10+ years of construction in which we build a new bridge, build new ramps leading to the new bridge, shift traffic over to the new bridge, rehab the existing bridge and ramps, and finally shift everything over to a dual-bridge configuration.

^If there is any real damage it is pretty minor.  They have rebuild sections of the El in Chicago without shutting it down completely.  They could easily replace stuff on a closed bridge just like jacking up joists when repairing a house with basement issues.  

 

The only thing that is a little worrisome is that the fire was relatively close to the center of the bridge, where I assume very minor warpage of the steel is a bigger issue than closer to the piers.  

tHe FiRe WaSn'T hOt EnOuGh tO mElT sTeEl

42 minutes ago, jmecklenborg said:

^If there is any real damage it is pretty minor.  They have rebuild sections of the El in Chicago without shutting it down completely.  They could easily replace stuff on a closed bridge just like jacking up joists when repairing a house with basement issues.  

 

The only thing that is a little worrisome is that the fire was relatively close to the center of the bridge, where I assume very minor warpage of the steel is a bigger issue than closer to the piers.  

I've seen written a few times that even though the crash happened at 2:45am "the bridge was still too hot for crews to inspect it on Wednesday afternoon". I know steel/concrete have a lot of thermal mass, but that must have been really hot to still be "too hot" 12 hours later. 

Per WKRC: "The second semi was hauling 110 pounds of potassium hydroxide. The chemical and 400 gallons of diesel fuel caught fire. It burned as hot as 1,500 degrees."

 

I don't want to speculate on whether or not that would affect the structural integrity of the bridge as a non-expert. But it sounds bad.

On a related note, if anyone has twitter, do yourself a favor and follow Brent Spence Bridge on twitter:

 

 

Run a  "express Southbank shuttle" from the Covington Transit Center to Government Square Run

1 hour ago, taestell said:

Per WKRC: "The second semi was hauling 110 pounds of potassium hydroxide. The chemical and 400 gallons of diesel fuel caught fire. It burned as hot as 1,500 degrees."

 

I don't want to speculate on whether or not that would affect the structural integrity of the bridge as a non-expert. But it sounds bad.

I'm kind of surprised that vehicles carrying hazardous materials were even allowed over the bridge. As far as I know, all hazardous materials are banned on I-75 between the river and I-275 in Kentucky. If that's the case, someone is going to be in a lot of trouble. 

You can get an exemption to the rule if you can prove are delivering it into town.

22 hours ago, jmecklenborg said:

They need cops at either end of the suspension bridge keeping trucks off the thing.  Not sure why simple stuff is so complicated in this town.  

As a more permanent solution, why don't KY and OH install 12' tall bright yellow clearance barriers so it's impossible for tractor trailers to even get to the Roebling. On the Ohio side the roundabout sort of does this by default, but as shown in the photo above the truck drivers can just jump the curb of the circle. Any vehicle taller than 12' is probably too heavy to be on the bridge anyway.