Condition of rail bridges in the area

[grumpyff 1,159]

Watching the 11pm news, the ABC& Investigators did a report of the condition of Amtrak owned bridges in the area, including New Rochelle. Pretty scary stuff, I know it is sensationalized for TV, but seeing some of the photos, you wonder how nothing has happened.

Here is a link to the article , with video : http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=...tors&id=4766303

[Guest]

The pieces of concrete that were on the ground and picked up by the reporter were not from bridge supports, but from the Catenary wire bridges. Not a lot of stress on those.

[x242Steve 1]

On a related note, it is important to make sure that MTA PD is notified any time a RR bridge is struck by a wayward over-height truck so that they can report it to their Engineers. This is one of those simple things that can easily be over-looked... and accountability goes hand in hand with liability. I can think of bridges in Rye, Port Chester and Stamford that are struck dozens of times a year.

[BmSmall92 1]

I worked on the Pelham Bay Bridge earlier this year protecting a group of contractors who were refurbishing the drawbridge. By refurbishing the bridge, they added a new tender house, new cables, and a "state of the art" computer system designed to operate the bridge much better. This refurb was suppose to help the bridge last another 20 years. With that said while I was there I saw top Amtrak engineering managment come to the bridge several times to inspections including the "official" inspection and this bridge passed. Right now Amtrak has this bridge low in priority because there are three bridges in CT that are dire need of being replaced before this one. What Amtrak needs right now is to get funding of 4 billion dollars just to fix the signals, bridges, and catenary.

[Guest alsfirefighter]

This goes hand in hand when you look at many of the train accidents that happen in our country. Ever wonder why there are so many derailments and accidents in other parts of the country, particulary the east, but we don't see many in our area? Because MTA spends money on maintaining their rail lines where Amtrak and the freight companies do not.

[Guest]

A very important aspect to think about which no one has yet mentioned. Besides the RR's own engineering and maintenance forces they ALL have to answer to the Ferderal RR Administration (FRA) who has jurisdiction over all RR's in the US. They do make inspections and require action where necessaryy.

Be careful about our "illustrious press". They are mostly looking for drama and do very little technical research.

Just because a structure looks lousy it does'nt necessarially mean it is unsound..