Brent Spence Bridge update set for Monday

 

Post staff report

 

Acting U.S. Secretary of Transportation Maria Cino will travel to the Cincinnati area Monday morning for an update on the Brent Spence Bridge project.

 

Gordon Proctor, Ohio Secretary of Transportation, will conduct the update, which will begin at Covington Landing with a boat tour of the bridge. It will end with a question and answer session.

 

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060708/NEWS02/607080329

Wide bridges almost always look clunky compared to narrow ones. 

 

The Leonard P. Zakim Bunker Hill Memorial Bridge in Boston is a 10 lane cable-stayed bridge. I always thought it looked good.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zakim_Bunker_Hill_Bridge

Feds: New bridge needed

Congressmen guide Spence tour by boat

BY MIKE RUTLEDGE | ENQUIRER STAFF WRITER

 

COVINGTON - Maria Cino spent her first day as acting secretary for the U.S. Department of Transportation examining the overworked Brent Spence Bridge from a boat.

 

Traveling the Ohio River on the upper deck of the P.A. Denny River Education Center paddle-wheeler, Cino discussed the span with U.S. Reps. Geoff Davis, R-Hebron, and Steve Chabot, R-Westwood.

 

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060711/NEWS0103/607110350

Toll option for Brent Spence studied

Cincinnati Post

Kerry Duke

September 9, 2006

 

 

CINCINNATI - In the future, motorists crossing the new Brent Spence Bridge might be required to pay tolls or fork over fees to use special lanes designed to whisk them through rush-hour backups on the span.

 

Those are a couple of the non-traditional ways that could be used to generate funds to help pay for the replacement or renovation of the 43-year-old bridge.

 

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060909/NEWS02/609090340

I would pay 50 cent to avoid a 30 minute delay.

A Cincinnati Post Editorial...

 

Fundamental fairness

 

 

Time to get out the BB guns, folks. Maybe the shotguns too.

 

The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet is floating a trial balloon that needs to be shot down now, while it's close to the ground: They're talking about charging a toll to cross the Ohio River on the successor to the Brent Spence Bridge.

 

"Anybody can do the math and see that the numbers just do not add up,'' Marc Williams, commissioner for Kentucky's Department of Highways, told The Post for a story published Saturday.

 

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060912/EDIT/609120311/1003

The Louisville argument is a good point, except that the city is on the Kentucky side in that case.

 

Tolls wouldn't be a bad idea if they could be used for the entire 75 widening from 275 to Kentucky, this might encourage some metro usage as well.

 

 

Planners weigh bridge options

 

By Kerry Duke

Post staff reporter

 

In about six months, planners hope to have winnowed down the options for renovating or replacing the Brent Spence Bridge from the five under consideration to perhaps two or three.

 

The next phase in the project - fieldwork and more detailed engineering drawings - will help planners make those choices.

 

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060918/NEWS01/609180384

Brent Spence price tag doubles

 

By Kerry Duke

Post staff reporter

 

The cost to replace or renovate the Brent Spence Bridge now ranges from $2.09 billion to $3.03 billion - more than twice earlier estimates.

 

Highway planners consider the new estimates to be more realistic than earlier ones that put costs at $900 million to $1.5 billion.

 

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060929/NEWS01/609290358

wtf??? We might as well build the light rail. That cost 2 billion and nearly 100 miles of rail.

I'm guessing that by extending the project scope from Kyles Lane to a point between Ezzard Charles Drive and the Western Hills Viaduct, they have redrawn plans and will create I-75 express lanes which will bypass Covington and downtown Cincinnati via a new bridge.  As I have contended for years the only way to significantly increase traffic volume is with express lanes.     

^Oh dear. I-75 was supposed to bypass all of the local streets. Now we are talking about bypassing the bypass.

 

  Was driving there at rush hour the other day and noticed that the Brent Spence was backed up for about 2 miles while the Clay Wade Bailey was nearly empty. My guess is that the Brent Spence Bridge isn't handling much "local" traffic anyway. They are not driving from Cincinnati to Covington. They are driving from West Chester to Florence, and a small percentage are driving from Michigan to Florida.

 

    Every single driver passing over that bridge made a personal decision to do so. Many of them chose to take jobs across the river from their homes. It's the same old city vs. suburb debate. Why encourage them to live farther out?

Right, when I worked at a place off the Union Center Blvd exit there were guys who drove up from Kentucky to make $8/hr.  And the thing is a lot of these guys don't even think twice about it.  There were guys with new $30,000 trucks making $8/hr, putting over half their earnings to in their car payment, so obviously you're not going to be able to reason with them about a commute.   

 

I also think this potentially longer bypass would be a way for them to get away with charging tolls, which look more likely in the face of such a steep price tag.  To throw some relative numbers out, to collect $1 on 150,000 daily vehicles would raise roughly $50 million per year, it would take roughly 60 years to pay off a $3 billion dollar project with tolls alone, assuming no interest and no inflation.         

 

 

I hope we get a new Brent Spence Bridge, and I hope it is paid for with tolls. But the news out yesterday is emblematic of the fact that higway investments are well into the curve of diminishing marginal returns.

 

The only sustainable solution is rail, both for commuters and for freight. It's no longer a question of "whether" -- only "when."

The bias against rail, that revenues don't cover operating expenses and pay back on the capital investment, is mysteriously absent when a highway project is proposed.  It's so frustrating when the $3 billion spent on this single project could pay for an extensive rail system serving upwards of 100,000 people daily.  The entire Washington Metro, 5 lines with 50 miles of tunnel and 30 more surface miles, cost approximately $10 billion in today's dollars.  It has 700,000 trips per weekday, eliminating hundreds of thousands of cars and parking spaces from the region.     

 

 

 

 

The bias against rail, that revenues don't cover operating expenses and pay back on the capital investment, is mysteriously absent when a highway project is proposed. 

 

Truer words have never been spoken.

From the 10/3/06 Cincinnati Post:

 

 

PHOTO: Workers from the H.C. Nutting Co. bore along the Kentucky shore of the Ohio River -- here near the Hampton Inn -- as part of the engineering study for the replacement of the Brent Spence Bridge.  TERRY DUENNES/The Post

 

Bedrock sought to build bridge

By Kerry Duke

Post staff reporter

 

A crew from the H.C. Nutting Co. drilled deep into the banks of the Ohio River in Covington on Monday for some data that will help planners choose among the five options to replace or renovate the Brent Spence Bridge.

 

Swaminathan Srinivasan, vice president/chief engineer with H.C. Nutting, a Cincinnati-based company of geotechnical, environmental and testing engineers, said his crew will take core samples of the bedrock in several locations on both sides of the river and in the river itself.

 

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061003/NEWS01/610030360/1010/RSS01

 

and to cost from $2.09 billion to $3.03 billion.

 

I love the precision..."oh, it'll cost somewhere between $2,091,223,948.75, and $3,028,934,044.39."  You know, when you leave a billion dollars worth of slack, I don't think you really need three significant digits...

And the flip side to that is the 1/2 cent stadium sales tax -- I'd trust a number like .04 cent or .06 cent more than half cent.  When you pass a tax like that you really have no idea how much revenue you'll be bringing in 10 years down the road, let alone 30.  The Banks garages would have been under contruction by now if they had passed even a .55 cent tax or avoided giving away money from the tax to Cincinnati Public Schools, which was a ploy during the campaign in 1996.

Another complicated piece of the puzzel for this mess of a project

 

I-75's Cut-In-The-Hill

It was fixed 12 years ago... so why are trucks wrecking so often?

TOM MITSOFF / CINCINNATI POST

October 22, 2006

 

COVINGTON - The crash was like hundreds of others in the stretch of Interstate 75/71 in Covington that's called the Cut-in-the-Hill.

 

Just before 9 p.m. Monday night, three semis barreling down the steep incline that begins north of Kyle's Lane somehow got too close to each other and then all hell broke loose, with chunks of truck and cargo flying.

 

One of the trucks wound up sprawled across all four lanes of traffic, another went halfway over the hill.

 

No one was injured, but the northbound lanes at the Fifth Street exit were closed for two hours while crews cleaned up the spilled freight and removed the mangled trucks.

 

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061021/NEWS02/610210320

Crews drill river bottom to test for bridge project

 

By Kerry Duke

Post staff reporter

 

 

Some of the answers needed by planners and engineers working on the Brent Spence Bridge project lie beneath the Ohio River.

 

That's where crews from the H.C. Nutting Co. went looking this week. From two barges just downstream from the bridge they've been drilling deep into the river bottom.

 

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061201/NEWS01/612010352

Why dont we build a new bridge, like the one over in Stubenville Ohio, spanning the Ohio River to Weirton West Virginia. Believe it's called the Veterans Memorial Bridge, that look's reall nice. New look and new image entrance to the QUEEN CITY :D

What I want:

 

^ I really like the look of that bridge! If a cable-stay is even considered, I will be pissed.

I'm with OldMojo:

 

 

He cited the Maumee River Crossing, a $220 million cable-stayed bridge now under construction in Toledo. That span, which will carry six lanes of traffic on Interstate 280, features numerous metal cables suspended from central towers.

 

 

 

Nooooooooo!!!!!! Cable-stayed bridges are everywhere now. If they want a distinctive design, they should look elsewhere. I vote for a slick deco/truss design akin to the Sydney Harbor bridge. Something stately that complements Cincinnati's historic character.

 

 

 

as long as it is a toll bridge, I am happy.

why do you want it to be a toll bridge?

because it will cost 3-4 billion dollars and the people who love highways always have these arguments about mass transit never being able to pay for itself so i want them to taste their own medicine and have it be bitter.

 

Also a toll bridge would probably divert some traffic downtown.  Hopefully these people will see something they like, stop and patronize a buisness there.  Then they won't have an irrational fear of downtown anymore and eventually move there. (thats the best case scenario).

The problem with making it a toll bridge is building the toll plaza. It would take tons of extra space to build it; space that isn't available on either side of the river.

 

Your reasoning for making it a toll road makes sense. I would like to see the bridge be some sort of "Signature Architecture" for Cincinnati.

There is simply not enough room to put a toll bridge. You have to stop to pay tolls which would make it gridlocked instantly. You would need 10-14 lanes at least toward the bridge on both side of the river as a buffer. There is simply not enough room for that many lanes in that area.

that is true

 

    Place the toll plaza way at the top of the hill by Kyle's Lane.

 

    If the toll were priced correctly, the traffic would not back up because some of the current users would stop using the bridge.

 

   

Perhaps you could toll the whole route between 275?

or every interstate highway in the country. that would cut down on the 200 billion dollars a year every year transportation bill.

 

    Place the toll plaza way at the top of the hill by Kyle's Lane.

 

    If the toll were priced correctly, the traffic would not back up because some of the current users would stop using the bridge.

 

    

Where would they go? I-471 that would be another 2 billion dollar bridge to replace.

>rs out, to collect $1 on 150,000 daily vehicles would raise roughly $50 million per year, it would take roughly 60 years to pay off a $3 billion dollar project with tolls alone, assuming no interest and no inflation.         

 

Sorry, I forgot to count trucks in that example.  So say 20,000 trucks per day at $5 and 150,000 cars at $1.  That's $100,000 per day from trucks and $150,000 from cars, or $250,000.  That is $91 million per year in revenue (I multiplied by 360 instead of 365 to account for slower weekend revenue, obviousy a detailed study would yield much more accurate numbers).  Also, so far as the location of toll booths, in NYC for example tolls are only charged in one direction (inbound) so that space is not wasted on toll booths in Manhattan.  Typical car tolls are $6 and trucks are much higher.  Buffalo, NY has a ton of toll booths for being such a small metro, btw.   

 

With a $1 toll, it would actually be more expensive in gas and wear to travel on I-471.  The argument for tolls is similar to the argument for dropping the federal income tax and replacing it with a 17% national sales tax -- it puts the true cost (or at least the hint of the true cost) of government infrastructure, entitlements, services, etc. in people's face each day.

Tolls in the new Brent Spence would be one way to secure the local match for a regional transit system. They could vary by time of day and the day of the week, and the price could change instantaneously based on traffic levels. Charge the trucks $5.00 at rush hour, but let them use it for a fraction of that sum in the middle of the night.

 

You wouldn't need a huge toll plaza. A lot of this can be done electronically through vehicle-mounted transponders that communicate with an overhead sensor. Commuters would get a bill something like a telephone bill each month. Large trucking companies would pay in the same manner.

 

The fundamental problem with local transportation in this country is that all the focus is on the supply side and none on the demand side.

If you have people get transponders, then people will bitch that you are "disenfranchising the poor" yet again because the transponders aren't economically available to everyone. Those who can't afford the transponders will be forced to wait in long lines at the toll plaza.

 

Took that argument from what I heard in the voting topics.  :-D

If you have people get transponders, then people will bitch that you are "disenfranchising the poor" yet again because the transponders aren't economically available to everyone. Those who can't afford the transponders will be forced to wait in long lines at the toll plaza.

 

Took that argument from what I heard in the voting topics.  :-D

 

"Life is not perfect." - John F. Kennedy

 

    "Tolls in the new Brent Spence would be one way to secure the local match for a regional transit system..."

 

    Are you saying you want BOTH a new Brent Spence bridge AND a transit system? Our cost just doubled, and so did our capacity.

 

    How about tolls on the EXISTING Brent Spence to pay for transit?

 

 

"How about tolls on the EXISTING Brent Spence to pay for transit?"

 

A new Brent Spence is pretty much baked in the cake at this point. Maybe it could be smaller if tolls caused some commuters to move to transit. And of course if you built a regional transit system, most of the new transit customers wouldn't be river-crossers. Brent Spence tolls would be a proxy for marginal cost pricing of regional travel. It would be far from perfect, but it would be an improvement.

 

John, I like your web site, but why does the purple line take a hard northward turn rather than go through clifton/uptown?  Is it just the way that the rail lines run?

The Purple Line enables people to go cross-county without having to go downtown. It's not so much of a "Line" unto itself but rather a combination of three lines that are used to produce this result.

 

Starting from the left at the Yellow Line along I-74, Metro added a segment between Northside and Elmwood Place to connect it with the Blue Line running through the Mill Creek Valley. Then it follows the Blue Line to Xavier where it connects to the Red Line (the Wasson Line along Dana) that goes to the eastern edge of Hamilton County.

 

You wouldn't change trains as you traveled along each of these different alignments; it would be a one-seat ride from Dent to Newtown. It was just an economical way of using discrete parts of other alignments to produce a fifth line in the system. I've walked a lot of it; it makes more sense on the ground than it does in the schematic map.

 

For those of you who wonder what we're talking about, go to www.protransit.com. ENTER the site and the map crawl starts to run. This is the plan that was on the ballot in 2002, and the map crawls reflect the sequence of construction Metro intended to follow in the thirty-year build-out of the system.

 

To answer your question, there is no way to cross Uptown by rail from west to east. So we had to go around the top of Uptown.

 

It was a great plan. Still is.

^Very cool site!

 

I've never seen the plan, quite interesting. Too bad Hamilton isn't/wasn't included.

I've never seen the plan, quite interesting. Too bad Hamilton isn't/wasn't included.

 

LOL.......thats too funny, Hamilton is always ignored when it comes to transit options...you should know that by now (see Ohio Hub plan, Metro Express routes, etc).

^ I-75!!!!!

 

Not really transit, but Hamilton was the second largest city in the United States left off the Interstate system!

 

 

Hamilton is apparently on some proposed line between Indy and Cincy, but I've never been able to find any information on that.

Not really transit, but Hamilton was the second largest city in the United States left off the Interstate system!

 

Thats hilarious!!!!!!!!!!!!  As for the rail line....don't hold your breath.  Hamilton is too busy getting the short end of the stick in every regional issue that comes up.

 

  "A new Brent Spence is pretty much baked in the cake at this point."

 

  If I understand correctly, it is at least 15 years away if everything goes according to plan. That takes us to 2021.

 

  Neither Kentucky nor Ohio has a budget for a new bridge, although they are contributing to studies and design. We are counting on federal money, which is not guranteed.

 

    The Enquirer reported that traffic counts on the bridge peaked in 1995. I am not confident that a new bridge will ever be built.

 

  I always get a laugh when the Great Brent Spence Bridge thread and the Great Peak Oil thread are next to each other on the forum. 

Here's what Portland (OR/WA) as doing with tolls on I-5 over the Columbia River:

 

 

It could be toll time for Interstate 5 drivers

Fee to cross Columbia also is suggested for Glenn Jackson bridge

By Jim Redden

 

The Portland Tribune Dec 7, 2006

 

Drivers must be required to pay tolls to cross the Interstate 5 replacement bridge being considered between Portland and Vancouver, Wash. – and tolls may need to be imposed on the existing Interstate 205 bridge, too.

 

Read the rest of the story: http://portlandtribune.com/news/story.php?story_id=116553448604480300

 

Here's a link to an incredible piece of police cruiser footage that culminaties with someone jumping off the Brent Spence Bridge.  I'm guessing this person died, I think it's pretty disrespectful that whoever uploaded this video set it to silly music. 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77pZANUGSHU