Friday, October 29, 2021

New Problems With Fort Worth's Three Bridges To An Imaginary Island


Apparently the Contractor, Panther Island partners at odds on final cost of three bridges.

We learn of this latest chapter in the multi-year Fort Worth bridge building boondoggle via an article in the Fort Worth Business Press.

Below are four paragraphs from this article. Below these four paragraphs we are going to talk about the second paragraph...

TxDOT officials also identified a “malfunction of design” as the cause of delays as far back as 2016.

Built over dry land to save money, the three bridges will eventually span a Trinity River channel to connect with the $1.17 billion Panther Island development north of downtown Fort Worth.

Prior to start of construction, there were suggestions that the design of the 7th Street bridge could be replicated and constructed quicker and less expensively than the V-pier design of Freese and Nichols.

But J.D. Granger, who oversees the Panther Island project and is the son of project champion U.S. Rep. Kay Granger, argued that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer had signed off on the V-pier design and a change would delay and possibly increase the cost of the bridges as well as possibly jeopardize the $526 million the project is expected to receive for channelizing the Trinity River to improve flood control.
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For longer than seven years we have been told, over and over and over again, that these three bridges were being built over dry land to save money. This article's mention of this is the first time I've seen it not mentioned that the bridges were also being built over dry land to save time.

The being built over dry land to save time claim becomes obviously ridiculous when it took an astonishing seven years to build three simple freeway overpass type bridges over dry land. Longer than it took to build the Golden Gate Bridge, over actual deep, fast moving water.

With the final price tag being way higher than originally projected, the saving money claim is also rendered bogus.

But, what is most annoying about this built over dry land to save time and money claim is that to suggest such is totally idiotic. 

I mean, how hard is it to see why claiming the bridges were purposefully being built over dry land to save time and money is totally idiotic?

There never was any other option but to build the three bridges over dry land.

That this must even be pointed out is like a metaphor for the entire Trinity River Vision Boondoggle.

If that cement lined ditch were built first, before the bridges, how would drivers drive to the other side of the channel? How could it ever have been an option to dig the ditch first, and add the bridges later?

I have read so many supposedly responsible adults repeat the bogus, ridiculous "built over dry land to save time and money" claim.

Congresswoman Kay Granger has repeated this nonsense. As has her son, J.D. Granger, currently paid $242,000 a year, to do what? No one seems to know what J.D. does to warrant being paid so much. Former Fort Worth Mayor, Betsy Price has spewed the "built over dry land to save time and money" nonsense. 

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram has repeatedly repeated the "built over dry land to save time and money" nonsense. As have other supposed news sources, including, now, the Fort Worth Business Press.

When will this absurdly ridiculous nonsense end?

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