Elsie Hotpepper Takes Us Back To America's Biggest Boondoggle

Yesterday, Elsie Hotpepper tagged me in a Facebook post, which is what you see a screen shot of.

For decades now, Elsie and I have been blogging about the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision.

More commonly known as America's Biggest Boondoggle.

The project to create an imaginary island has been going on for most of this century. I recollect the first time I found myself befuddled and appalled by this was a long ago Sunday edition of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, with a HUGE banner headline touting "TRINITY UPTOWN TO TURN FORT WORTH INTO VANCOUVER OF THE SOUTH."    

What fresh ridiculous nonsense is this, I read and wondered? Who could have imagined the ridiculous nonsense could go on for so long, for decades, with little to show for the effort.

Well, there are those three little bridges, built over dry land, to connect the Fort Worth mainland to that imaginary island. Those three little bridges are waiting for a cement lined ditch to be installed under them, with Trinity River water diverted into the ditch, making the imaginary island.

The article Elsie Hotpepper directed me to was in the Fort Worth Report, titled City of Fort Worth prepares to kickstart Panther Island development — again.

Just the title to this article struck me as odd. The city is preparing to kickstart America's Biggest Boondoggle again?

I was not aware the development had stalled. The last it was much in the news was when Congresswoman's Kay Granger's son, J.D., was removed from the executive director job he was totally not qualified to do, whilst being grossly overpaid, and then hired by the Boondoggle, post firing, to be a Trinity River Vision Boondoggle consultant for $12K a month.

The only other news about the Boondoggle that I can recollect in recent years is those three pitiful little bridges finally being completed, after seven years, that, and Fort Worth got $400 million from the Democrat's infrastructure bill, which J.D.'s mother voted against.

It has long bugged me that, if, as touted, this is a vitally needed flood control and economic project, why has it limped along in slow motion, begging for a federal funding, rather than voting to pay for the vitally needed project themselves, like town's wearing their big city pants do?

And, need we repeat, this vitally needed flood control project is in an area which has not flooded in well over half a century, due to flood control levees already in place, which you in the more prosperous parts of America, already paid for. While other areas of Fort Worth, as in East Fort Worth, and other areas of Tarrant County, have real, serious, un-addressed deadly flood control issues.

Now, let's take a look at some of the gems of nonsense from this article about America's Biggest Boondoggle...

The Central City Flood Project could transform a partially blighted expanse of land just north of downtown into about 440 acres of prime real estate — also known as the Panther Island Project. 

Could transform a blighted expanse of land? Could? After all this time, all this money, this project is stuck at could? And it is now known, simply, as the Panther Island Project? When did that happen? Whatever happened to the Trinity River Vision Authority, over which J.D. Granger was the Executive Director for years.

No mention is made in this article of the Trinity River Vision Authority.

Or J.D. Granger.

Or that J.D.'s mother voted against the funding that might finally give Fort Worth enough money to dig that cement lined ditch under those three bridges.

The project, which has experienced decades of delays, received over $400 million in federal funding this year, enough money to design and build two bypass channels. The corps recently projected the project will take eight to 10 years to complete.

Is there no investigative journalist in the Fort Worth vicinity who might want to look into why and how this project has experienced decades of delays? We are up to two bypass channels now? Taking another decade to complete? Yes, this seems very vitally needed.

And the nonsense continues...

The new strategic plan will be the second iteration of a plan for the Panther Island Project. The city and Tarrant Regional Water District initially developed its plan for the island, also known as the form-based code, in the early 2000s and revisited it in 2016 — all before the project received over $400 million from the federal government.

New strategic plan? Does anyone know what the old strategic plan was? The city and TRWD initially developed its plan for the island, known as form-based code? So, the new total name of America's Biggest Boondoggle is Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Form-Based Code Vision?

And then we have this doozy, including a Fort Worth staple...

A redevelopment project the size of Panther Island in the core of the city is unique, said Kenneth Barr, chair of the Real Estate Council. “Other cities would be very envious of us having the opportunity,” Barr said. 

Oh yes, many towns in America would be envious to have an industrial wasteland adjacent to their downtown. And another one east of their downtown. Most big cities do not develop with such tracts of wasteland adjacent to their downtowns. Hardly anything to be envious of.

And, finally...

“My vision for Panther Island is that it’d be a world-class place for tourists to come and visit and see the best of Fort Worth, but also a place where our local residents can enjoy and feel like it’s for them as well,” Landeros said. 

How can anyone who has been to an actual world-class tourist destination possibly think this imaginary island can ever possibly be such? Just look at that stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth you see in the screen cap at the top. This is not a world-class town in any sense of the term....

Clueless Toddler Of A Town Solicits Bridge Naming Help

Yesterday the entity calling him or herself Cowtown Crude, whilst describing him or herself as rude, crude, and socially unacceptable, left a blog comment...

Cowtown Crude has left a new comment on your post "Bike Takes Me To New Section Of Circle Trail In Lake Wichita Park":

Name the Panther Island bridges contest!

Help choose the names for three new Trinity River bridges

Last night Elsie Hotpepper pointed me to the same thing in a Facebook post about an NBC DFW item about the same subject. Elsie told me the comments were hilarious, to which I replied I saw no comments, to which Elsie screen capped the comments, which you can read by clicking here.

For those not familiar with America's Biggest Dumbest Boondoggle, here's the abridged version.

Near the start of this century it was announced that Fort Worth was going to be transformed into being the Vancouver of the South via something which was then called Trinity Uptown. Within a few years this name morphed into being the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision.

In 2014, that which was already being referred to as The Boondoggle, began construction of three simple freeway overpass type bridges, built in slow motion over dry land.

It took til 2021 to finish the building of these three little bridges, which you see pictured in the above screen cap.

The Henderson Bridge, North Main Bridge, and White Settlement Bridge.

Already seemingly named after the roads which cross the bridges.

But now the city of Fort Worth is initiating a bridge naming event, soliciting the public's input for bridge names.

From the two webpages Cowtown Crude pointed us to....

Now that the construction is complete for the three new Trinity River bridges, we want your help in naming them.

The bridges will span the future Trinity River bypass channel as part of the Central City Flood Control Project being designed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Given the significance of the Central City project and bridges, Mayor Mattie Parker wants you to help us find the best name for each bridge.

Please provide your suggested name for each bridge.

When suggesting a name, please keep the following criteria in mind:

Promote community pride and connectivity to the Trinity River

Celebrate the culture and history of Fort Worth related to:

• Geographic location or neighborhood of the bridge
• Outstanding feature of the bridge or area
• Commonly recognized event, group or deceased individual

Not be offensive or controversial

Now that construction is complete and traffic is flowing over the three Panther Island bridges, Fort Worth residents are encouraged to help name them.

________________________

Naming these lame bridges to promote community pride? Will this counteract the community embarrassment that the building of these simple little bridges over dry land took seven years? Way longer than it took to build the Golden Gate Bridge over actual water.

And the citizens of San Francisco were not asked to help with the naming of that actual iconic bridge.

Named after an outstanding feature of the bridge? Or the area it is bridging? What is even remotely outstanding about any of these three little bridges?

Name the first bridge finished "Took Too Long To Build". The second bridge completed "Took Even Longer To Build" with the last bridge completed named "Took Longest To Build". 

Because the only thing even remotely remarkable about these bridges is that it took seven years to build them. Over dry land. Awaiting a cement lined ditch to be dug under the bridges, with Trinity River water diverted into the ditch, thus creating an imaginary island.

How does a town like Fort Worth manage to come up with so many ways to embarrass itself? I know it's the Fort Worth Way, but one would think at some point the locals would rebel and insist their town act like a city wearing its big city pants, instead of a clueless toddler of a town....

Fort Worth Is Almost Done Cleaning Its Imaginary Island

Yesterday the DFW entity known by some as Elsie Hotpepper sent me a link via a Facebook message.

The link was to an article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram titled Millions have been spent to clean up chemicals in Fort Worth. The work is nearly done.

The Hotpepper message accompanying the link simply said "You will have a field day with this one..."

That image you see above is a screen cap from the aforementioned article. That is one of Fort Worth's new amazing iconic signature bridges you see in the foreground. There are three of these amazing bridges, which have been such complex feats of engineering that construction on them is still not complete seven years after building began with a celebratory TNT explosion way back in 2014.

You may not be able to click the link and get past the Star-Telegram paywall. For some reason I am able to do so. So, let's take a look at this article.

We start with the first paragraph perplexing me...

For more than a decade, the Tarrant Regional Water District has spent upwards of $43 million to remove toxic chemicals from two dozen properties in Fort Worth’s industrial north side.

I have long opined that America's Biggest Boondoggle would one day get much bigger when toxic chemicals get discovered requiring an EPA Superfund type cleanup.

But, I guess I was wrong about that and the toxic cleanup has been going on for more than a decade.

The TRWD has spent upwards of $43 million of TRWD funds to do this cleanup? Why wasn't the EPA involved, with the Superfund paying for the cleanup? At one point in time, this century, Tacoma had the biggest EPA Superfund cleanup in Superfund history, when the Asarco smelting plant property was cleaned up to prepare for the massive Point Ruston development.

Moving on to the second paragraph...

Now, only two sites remain between the district and its goal to complete the “largest single voluntary cleanup program in the state of Texas,” according to Woody Frossard, the water district’s environmental director.

Are we actually bragging that this is the largest voluntary cleanup in the state of Texas? And this has been a goal? To have the largest voluntary cleanup? Seems like there are plenty of other things the TRWD might focus on as a worthwhile goal.

Continuing on...

The effort to remove more than 300,000 cubic yards of contaminated soil and treat more than 44 million gallons of water was spurred by the Panther Island/Central City flood control project.

I think I remember reading J.D. Granger bragging about all the contaminated dirt that had been removed. Where did this contaminated soil get moved to? Did anyone get photo documentation of the dirty dirt being moved? 44 million gallons of water was treated? How? Was the water transported to a water treatment plant where it was circulated back into the water supply? 

And then we have this...

Congress authorized federal funding for digging the channel in 2016, but has not sent the money to Fort Worth in the years since. The project would return flood protection to more than 2,400 acres inhabited by Fort Worth residents, according to a city press release.

Why hasn't the federal funding been sent to Fort Worth you are likely wondering? Didn't we read somewhere that the fact that there has been no required Feasibility Study completed, or some such thing, needed before the Army Corps of Engineers can give the go ahead? The project would return flood protection? As if the area is not already protected by levees built well over a half century ago, with no flooding in the protected area since the levees were built.

Continuing on we read that the water district's environmental director, Woody Frossard would not name the two remaining properties in need of cleanup, but he is optimistic those two properties will be cleaned up in the next fiscal year, which starts in October, and then in the next paragraph...

“Once I get these two properties remediated, I am completely through with environmental remediation for the bypass channel,” Frossard said. “There will be no additional environmental restrictions to keep the Corps from starting construction as soon as they get funding.”

Once those two properties get cleaned up there is nothing but lack of funding to stop the Army Corps of Engineers from starting to dig the ditch? What about that required Feasibility Study? And also, from what this Frossard guy is saying, there will be no ditch digging for yet one more year, with the Corps unable to dig the ditch until those two properties are cleaned up. 

I'm done with the commenting. I'll just copy the rest of the article for your reading enlightenment...

Due to its history of housing a petroleum refinery, two metal refineries and a metal reclamation facility, Fort Worth’s northern section required significant cleanups to address decades of contamination. Water district officials began identifying those sites in 2004, with remediation work starting in the mid-2000s, Frossard said.

Earlier this month, the water district announced the completion of its cleanup at Fort Worth’s former police and fire training center and an adjacent property on Calvert Street. For decades, trainees shot lead bullets at the firing range and practiced putting out fires using aqueous film forming foam, a popular fire suppressant containing perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, commonly known as PFAS.

PFAS chemicals, which are found in many consumer products, are known as “forever chemicals” because they are highly persistent and accumulate in people’s bodies rather than breaking down, said Dr. Katherine Pelch, a professor at the University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth who studies PFAS and public health.

Frossard said the most difficult chemicals to remove are those toxic to humans, especially with the amount of lead found at the former training center, which sits near the Charles. H. Haws Athletic Center.

“For all the years of shooting, they’ve shot shotguns, rifles and pistols so there was obviously a lot of spent lead there,” he said. “We had to have a special crew come in that had to be suited up so that they could actually get in there and collect all of the lead material … That was the very first thing that had to be done: the lead contamination had to be removed and contained.”

Two concrete towers at the center are still awaiting demolition, and Frossard plans to request funding for that project at the water district’s next board meeting.

Although cleanups have officially been completed at 26 of 28 properties identified by the water district, the process of earning certificates of completion from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality could take several extra months. The water district has received 21 certificates so far, Frossard said.

Frossard has been with the water district for the entirety of the cleanup process, and is proud to have seen the district clean north Fort Worth so that it’s safe for residential development.

“We cleaned up everything to residential standards, which means you can build houses on it, kids can play in the dirt,” he said. “There’s less restrictive state standards out there, like commercial or industrial, that would limit our ability to use the property for any other purpose. The highest standard is residential, and we have cleaned it up to the highest standard.”

On His Way Out The TRWD Door Jim Oliver Lets Loose Loopy Defense Of J.D. Granger

 

A couple days ago we blogged about 225 Feet Of Panther Island Canal Ready For Riverwalking. after reading a Fort Worth online magazine article about Fort Worth's Boondoggle known as the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision.

In that article we found ourselves freshly appalled by J.D. Granger due to his penchant for unfortunate verbiage. This what J.D. said about the Boondoggle's diversion channel canal...

“Locals will never know it. Everyone’s walking down with a margarita — might fall in because you’re drunk — [and] they just think it’s pretty. But actually, it serves a very important purpose.”

________

On Facebook there were multiple comments about J.D.'s various utterances in this article. Comments along the line of how does this idiot not get fired?

Also, in this Fort Worth magazine article J.D. tries to explain why it has taken so long for the Boondoggle to get anything done, claiming the area of the bridges as having been an "environmental hot mess" elaborating with...

“We were having to buy the property, move the property, demo the property, do the environmental cleanup — all of that had to take place before the bridges could even start,” Granger says, adding that the amount of hazardous materials removed totaled to about 330,000 tons.

_________

Multiple people have asked how could it be possible that 330,000 tons of hazardous waste were removed before construction of the little bridges could begin? And where did all that, likely imaginary, tonnage of hazardous waste go?

Last night my phone made its incoming text message noise. Twice. On the second instance I got vertical and found my phone. Text messages from Elsie Hotpepper. The first saying "OMG" with the second a link to an article in the most recent edition of the Fort Worth Report, specifically an article titled On his way out the door, water district general manager lets loose, emails reveal.  

The first three paragraphs of this Fort Worth Report article...

With retirement imminent, Water District General Manager Jim Oliver strongly aired his grievances to board members about the perception of the Panther Island/Central City Flood Control project.

Emails obtained by Fort Worth Report through a Texas Public Information Act request show Oliver defending the head of the project, JD Granger.

Oliver’s email came after Granger had made a Facebook post that the new board president, Leah King, told the Report on Tuesday was “in poor taste.”

______________

J.D. made the controversial post on Facebook. That post is what you see screen capped above. 

The post, accompanied by a picture of Granger with two others on the White Settlement bridge, read in part, “This bridge opening is just another expected milestone towards the completion of a project that makes the old guard in Fort Worth uncomfortable. … And at the finish line everyone will think it was easy and take all the credit.

_______________

Take all the credit? More likely it will be blame and shame which will be the theme of the final reckoning of this multi-decade debacle.

Just look at that bridge J.D. and two of his minions are standing on. J.D. and his fellow propagandists have long hyperbolized that this bridge along with the other two being built over dry land, will be iconic signature bridges. It truly is mind boggling that someone can try and sell such nonsense, and still keep his job which currently pays him well over $200,000 a year.

Via the Texas Public Information Act the Fort Worth Report received multiple emails in which Jim Oliver defends J.D. Granger. You can read the email exchanges in the On his way out the door, water district general manager lets loose, emails reveal.

My favorite of Jim Oliver's defenses of J.D. was this...

Oliver concluded the email by saying he’d talk with Granger about the post but chalked it up to him “pushing the envelope” because “that’s what creative and driven people often do.”

_____________

Creative? What has J.D. created? Being part of America's Biggest Boondoggle?

Now that Fort Worth seems to have at least two news sources which seem to be doing actual investigative journalism, perhaps someone can find out exactly what it is J.D. Granger does which has warranted paying him so much for so many years? Along with maybe finding out what it is, exactly, that J.D.'s wife, Shanna, does that has her on the payroll. 

Also, it would be a good thing to investigate the mechanism by which J.D. Granger was selected to be the Executive Director of what has become America's Biggest Boondoggle. Why would a low level prosecuting attorney be hired to do a job for which he had zero experience or qualifications?

As Steve A (and others) have frequently said, "Inquiring minds want to know"...

Kay Granger Says Fort Worth's Boondoggle Will Get Buckets Of Federal Funding In 2022

Yesterday Fort Worth had a celebratory ceremony to celebrate the opening to traffic of the bridge you see in the photo above. Local propagandists have long propagandized that this bridge and its two siblings were going to be iconic signature bridges.

No. I am not making that up.

Construction of these three simple little bridges began way back in 2014. Two of the three are now, in 2021, completed.  Sort of.

This Sunday morning's Fort Worth Star-Telegram had an article about that which has become America's Biggest & Most Embarrassing Boondoggle. This Fort Worth’s Panther Island will get federal funding in 2022, US Rep. Kay Granger says article contains some of the usual propaganda gems.

Along with failing to make mention of one big piece of reality. With that reality being that federal funding has not been forthcoming for Fort Worth's poorly planned, ineptly implemented public works project because of the requirement that a feasibility study is required before federal funding can be considered.

We blogged about the feasibility study problem just a couple months ago in Fort Worth Opens One Of Its Bridges To Nowhere Over Dry Land.

Before that we blogged about the feasibility study problem in August of 2020 in Panther Island Board Wants No Feasibility Study Of Fort Worth's Embarrassing Boondoggle.

And even way further back in March of 2010 in CONFLUENCE: A River & A Creek Runs Through Tarrant County Losing Dollars & Lives reference is made to the feasibility study issue way back in February of 2001, in the following paragraph from that blog post...

A feasibility study for the watershed had been initiated by the US Army Corps of Engineers in February 2001. In a letter to Congresswoman Kay Granger in November 2009, Col. Richard Muraski of the Corps stated that, "Due to a variety of issues, including a lack of consistent funding, higher priority work and technical shortcomings, completion of the study has taken longer than normal." He went on to state that the Corp recognized the "history of destructive flooding" in the area and that approximately $100,000 would be provided to "continue the studies of the Big Fossil Creek watershed."

The flood prone watershed referred to in the above paragraph is not the area focused on by the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision, where there has been no flooding for well over half a century. Kay Granger has shown ZERO real concern for the area of her congressional district which has actually had, and continues to have, deadly destructive flooding.

The first three paragraphs of this latest Star-Telegram article about the Boondoggle...

The Panther Island project will see enough federal money in the 2022 funding cycle to begin digging the channel under the already-built bridges, U.S. Rep. Kay Granger said Saturday.

Granger, R-Fort Worth, said it’s not clear how much funding will come through for the project, but she’s confident it will be enough to begin cutting the 1.5-mile channel.

“It comes in different buckets, so there may be some in this one and then some in the next one,” Granger said. “I think it will be funded for everything they can spend in the next cycle.”

______________

Enough funding to begin digging in 2022? And the funding will come in different buckets? Like has already been said, there is to be no federal funding without a feasibility study. Or has that requirement been dropped?

Granger made these funding comments at yesterday's ribbon cutting grand opening of the North Main Street bridge.

And then we have the following two paragraphs...

But for now, all three bridges span dry land. Officials, including Granger, have long said that it was cheaper and easier to build the bridges first and then cut the channel that will connect the ends of a U-shaped bend in the Trinity River. The area known as Panther Island is not actually an island until water begins flowing through the channel.

“We didn’t have to do the water this way, but it was the smart way, it could be done faster and cheaper,” Granger said.

__________________

The smart way? We didn't have to do the water this way? Officials, including Granger, have long said it was cheaper and easier to build the bridges first and then cut the channel?

How many times has it been repeated that there was no logical option other than to build the bridges over dry land. It would have been idiotic to dig a ditch first, fill it with water, and then build the bridges. Without the bridges that ditch would be a serious obstacle to traffic.

Why do these supposed "officials" repeat this nonsense over  and over again?

Easier to build the bridges first? It has taken over 7 years to easily build these bridges.

Way longer than it took to build the Golden Gate bridge.

To illustrate how idiotic this cheaper and easier to build the bridges over dry land nonsense is, it would be like way back in the 1930s there was no water in San Francisco Bay. And the city decided to build a suspension bridge over dry land to connect to Marin County, and then fill the land under the bridge with water to create a bay. With the local officials repeating over and over and over again that it was cheaper and easier to build the bridge over dry land, as if there was any other logical option.

As has also been said over and over again, if the reality of this Fort Worth project was is as touted, that is, as a vitally needed flood control economic development scheme, why has this project limped along for most of this century?

Waiting for the rest of America to pay for it.

When Fort Worth voters have not voted to support this project by approving any sort of funding bond issue. Does Kay Granger actually believe that when she tries to finagle federal funding for her son's Boondoggle that other Representatives won't raise objections to funding the Fort Worth Boondoggle?

All you have to do is look at that photo of the newly opened bridge to see a visual metaphor for the quality of the Trinity River Vision. If any of the rest of the vision becomes anything someone can see do you think the quality will be of the same level as these three imaginary iconic signature bridges? 

Or worse...

Can Trinity River Vision Boondogglers Build Bridges Any Faster?

No, anyone familiar with Fort Worth's current sponsorship of America's Biggest Boondoggle, that is not what you might think it is which you are looking at here.

No, it is not a section of one of Fort Worth's pitiful Panther Island bridges, stuck in slow motion construction, barely above the ground, slowly built over dry land.

What you are looking at here is a section of light rail under construction in the Sound Transit zone of Puget Sound. I am guessing this is a section heading into downtown Bellevue.

I saw this Could Sound Transit build light rail faster? It wouldn’t be easy article this morning in the Seattle Times, and once again was struck by the fact that an article like this, with facts such as those contained in the article, about the subject of a local public works project, is not the type thing one would ever expect to read in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram about something like Fort Worth's Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District, which has become America's Biggest Boondoggle.

Have you seen an article headline in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram along the line of Could Trinity River Vision Build Bridges Faster? Nope, that newspaper has not had a single line of legit explanation as to what the problem has been with the building of those three simple little bridges being built over dry land to possibly one day manage to connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island.

Just the first four paragraphs of this Could Sound Transit build light rail faster? It wouldn’t be easy article contain elements one would never expect to read in an article about Fort Worth's hapless project in that town's hapless only newspaper of record...

When Sound Transit successfully sought a record $54 billion tax package to finance eight light-rail extensions, more commuter rail and bus rapid transit in 2016, the agency’s supporters called their campaign Mass Transit Now.

They chose that slogan even though some rail lines won’t open for another 11 to 22 years.

Traffic Lab recently asked readers what they’d like to know about Puget Sound transportation, and the most popular question came from Timothy Chang: “Is it possible to speed up the construction of light rail? If so, how?”

Construction schedules of five to 10 years are typical for major transit projects in the U.S. and Europe, and can’t be compressed much, as Sound Transit CEO Peter Rogoff has often said. In the Seattle area, planning and engineering take just as long. The best way to speed light-rail delivery may be for politicians and community members to unite early on easy-to-build routes.

_________________

Fort Worth locals, how many things can you spot in the above four paragraphs that you would not expect to see in a Fort Worth Star-Telegram article about the town's infamous imaginary flood control boondoggle?

Let's see if we can help.

Imagine the concept of convincing voters to approve a $54 billion bond issue, in 2016. Two years after Fort Worth began construction, with a TNT boom, of its three little bridges over dry land, hoping to one day connect the Fort Worth mainland to that imaginary island. Fort Worth voters have never voted to fund the building of those bridges, in any legitimate sense, any aspect of that which has become such an embarrassing Boondoggle. That 2016 Sound Transit bond issue passage was only the most recent voter approval to Sound Transit proposals.

In the second paragraph we do see something in common between this Puget Sound area project and Fort Worth's Boondoggle. Some rail lines won't open for another 11 to 22 years. The Fort Worth Boondoggle has an ever shifting project timeline, but many observers do not think anyone will be actually able to see the Trinity River Vision for another decade or two.

Something called Traffic Lab asked Puget Sound locals about Puget Sound transportation issues. And got legit feedback. Fort Worth's Boondoggle touts imaginary public input at meetings no one has any record of having happened, which the Fort Worth Boondoggle propagandists tout resulted in almost 100 citizen requested amenities be part of the imaginary vision.

Anyway, it seems just baffling how two areas of the same nation can be so different, one operating in a modern, progressive democratic type fashion, the other fumbling along in third world backwards backwater mode.

So perplexing, all those knuckleheads who run Fort Worth in their old-fashioned Fort Worth Way have to do is go a few miles to the east, to Arlington, or Dallas, to see a town more successfully manage building big things. Or go visit Austin.

You do not have to exit Texas to visit modern America, but you do have to leave Fort Worth...

Will Panther Island's Encore Include Sinking Bridges?

Years ago, during one of his many embarrassing propaganda pronouncements, Trinity River Vision Boondoggle Executive Director, J.D. Granger, told the gullible that that year, whatever the year was, 2015? 2016?, that that year construction would begin on the first of many building projects to be built on Fort Worth's imaginary island, with this initial project a residential complex called "Encore Panther Island".

One of those propaganda pronouncements from years past said "Proposed 300 unit apartment community scheduled to begin construction in the summer of 2017 with completion 12 months later."

But, nothing happened. And then in an online discussion about this stalled Fort Worth embarrassment the photo you see above was posted on April 25, 2018, with accompanying text saying "Signs and fence are up, at a very minimum."

Earlier this year I asked a pair of observers who are located in a location overlooking the mess which has become America's Biggest Boondoggle if they were seeing any construction of this Encore building which Granger long ago indicated would be a done deal by now. That pair of observers, known as Deep Moat III, reported back that they have seen some ground work at the location, but little of what one might called vertical progress.

And then today I got a Facebook message from the entity known as Captain Andy pointing me to a Fort Worth Architecture Forum discussion about the Encore Panther Island project.

You need to read the entire two page multi-comment discussion to get the full effect. Suffice to say I have seldom seen so much optimistic delusion so earnestly on display, well for the first couple years of discussing the Encore Panther Island project, then, of late, reality seems to have set in.

Before reality set in reading this reminded me of a Rockford Files episode where Rockford uncovers a scam where senior citizens were being sold imaginary waterfront lots on an imaginary lake next to an imaginary clubhouse. Whilst being very excited about what they were imagining, even though all they could see was desert wasteland.

So, this Encore Panther Island forum discussion begins in 2016 with a poster breathless posting that "It's on". Meaning the project, after who knows how long since J.D. Granger announced it.

This is followed with artist renderings of the building, along with more breathless excitement about the design. (Have none of these people visited modern America, I read this stuff and wonder? How about a field trip to Scottsdale and Chandler Arizona? They would see multiple instances of residential design, with water features, far more impressive than these cartoon drawings they drooled over).

So, moving ahead to 2019 in this forum and the stark Boondoggle reality filters in, with forum members asking about the lack of progress, and then excitement over seeing some progress take place, with workers working on it for a few hours in the morning.

The comments begin to get a bit snarky at that point, with one suggesting that maybe they work on Encore in the morning and the bridges in the afternoon.

Multiple photos of the "progress" show up. With a lot of puzzlement regarding the engineering of this project, with some saying they'd never seen a project progress in such a way.

Some comments wondering about the canal which is supposed to be part of this project. As in if they are digging the canal now, what will it connect to, what with there being no promised lake, as yet.

And then comments about seeing a multi-level garage go up, just recently, as in the past couple months.

And now in July complete befuddlement upon seeing workers tearing down the garage they had just built. With one person confirming the tear down news saying "Evidently so, and probably to start over. Must have been a structural defect."

With had another saying, "Yikes. I guess this is a taste of what's to come with the Panther Island bridges."

And then we learned what apparently has actually happened, with Austin55 telling us "Evidently the garage was sinking. Curious how they will handle this. Any forum engineer types weigh in?"

Which had another saying "I am not an engineer, but I believe the first step is to have all the women and children board the lifeboats."

Another person, in the quest to find out what has happened, posted he has alerted Luke Ranker at the Star-Telegram, because Ranker has been covering Panther Island and related topics.

Uh, looking for answers via investigative journalism practiced by Fort Worth's only newspaper is futile, a fact long established by the years of delusional propaganda that newspaper has spewed about that which has become America's Biggest Boondoggle.

Has the Star-Telegram told you in detail, yet, what has been the design problem with the simple little bridges being built over dry land?  Do you think the Star-Telegram will find out why the Encore garage was sinking? And how big a setback this is? And what a sinking garage portends for any other construction on the imaginary island.

Methinks this sinking garage is what is known as a metaphor.

That being a metaphor for the entire sinking project...

Brazos River Cruise To Waco's Signature V-Pier Bridge Built Over Actual Water

For illustrative purposes I searched for an image of one of the River Safari cruise ship river boats of the sort which the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision's Party Planner Division has contracted with to float river boat cruises on the super scenic Trinity River as it passes by the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth.

The River Safari cruise ship river boat operation is headquartered in Waco, Texas. I assume the above photo shows a River Safari river boat on the Brazos River at a location on the actually scenic Brazos River as it passes through Waco.

Among the actual scenic scenery one would see via a River Safari river boat cruise on the Brazos River is an actual real non-imaginary signature bridge, that being the iconic Waco Suspension Bridge. A short distance from that bridge one would float by the scenic cliffs of Cameron Park.

And imagine my surprise when I found the above photo and I saw the bridges. The first one looks like one of the pedestrian bridges which cross the Trinity River near the location of the Trinity River Vision's inner tube parties at the location of the Boondoggle's imaginary island.

And then there is the surprise of the second bridge.

Let's take a closer look at that surprising second bridge...

Are those V-piers holding up that bridge?

V-piers?

You know, those supposedly unique, one-of-a-kind piers which America's Biggest Boondoggle's propagandaists tout as making America's Biggest Boondoggle's bridges "signature" bridges, destined to become iconic symbols of, well, currently, iconic symbols of America's Biggest Boondoggle.

Those Fort Worth V-piers being built over dry land are now well into their 5th year of construction, with no end in sight until, maybe, some point in the next decade.

Did J.D. Granger and his Confederacy of Dunces copy a Waco bridge design before copying Waco's river boat cruises?

Is the Brazos River a polluted e.coli infested murky mess like the Trinity River? My times seeing the Brazos it looked like a normal river, not anything close to being a glorified ditch with heavily littered banks.

And another thing we have been wondering about regarding the Fort Worth version of Waco's Brazos River river boat cruises.

What with the Fort Worth version being a Trinity River Vision Party Planner Division operation, of course, booze consumption is a component, with the BYOB concept being pushed by the TRVPPD chief planner, Shanna Cate (Granger*).

Are there restroom facilities of the modern sort on board the Trinity River cruise ships? Or will the restroom facilities be the Fort Worth norm of an outhouse, or two, somewhere on one of the cruise ship's decks?

*We still have not received confirmation that the nuptials between Shanna Cate and her formerly married boyfriend, J.D. Granger, actually took place, as planned, on an isolated Caribbean island last February.

Trinity River Boat Tours Latest Idiocy From Fort Worth's Embarrassing Boondoggle

If I remember right, and sometimes I do, it was via Elsie Hotpepper, last week, that I first learned of the latest embarrassingly bizarre nonsense from the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision.

More commonly known as America's Biggest Boondoggle.

Or history's slowest un-needed public works project since the Great Pyramid of Giza.

Nothing with the Boondoggle ever seems to be completed, but new imaginary elements are added, as earlier elements fail.

Such as the obviously doomed to die Cowtown Wakepark, which TRVA Executive Director, J.D. Granger, touted as bringing the coveted sport of wakeboarding to an urban setting. This turned out to be an eyesore of a polluted pond which could only accommodate four wakeboarders at a time. Yet no one apparently intuited the obvious soon to happen fiscal failure.

And now America's Biggest Boondoggle is adding River Boat Tours on the Trinity River.

Someone with the name Anonymous made a comment on last week's blog post about Fort Worth's Panther Island Toxicity, with the comment containing links to two sources of info about this latest aspect of America's Biggest Boondoggle...

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Fort Worth's Panther Island Remains Toxic While Tacoma Exemplifies Civic Reinvention": 

Formidable Fort Worth will soon offer river boat tours on the Trinity River.

River boat tours coming to Trinity River

Trinity River Cruises

_____________________

The first link goes to an informative article about Fort Worth's River Boat tours, whilst the second link goes to an online forum all about Fort Worth architecture (and related subjects, such as River Boat tours).

I have experienced the "insights" of those participating in the Fort Worth Architecture Forum in past years. Seems like at least a decade ago I saw some in that forum participating in sort of complaining about me characterizing the Trinity River Vision as being a Boondoggle. This was even before the slow motion building of three simple little bridges over dry land added one more bizarre element to the ongoing growing Boondoggle.

The informative article about Fort Worth's River Boat tours is in the Fort Worth Business Press. I don't quite know what to make of the FWBP's slant in this article. Did they decide to just leave it to the readers to see the absurdity without pointedly pointing it out?

Who knows?

But, let's go through this article about River boat tours coming to Trinity River and see what we think about what we are reading.

Okay, the first paragraph...

Landlocked Fort Worth may seem an unlikely place for scenic boat tours but that’s about to happen as soon as next month.

Scenic boat tours? Scenic? The Trinity River in Fort Worth only becomes remotely scenic when it leaves the downtown zone and gets to Gateway Park, leaving the levees and dams behind. But that is not where these scenic boat tours are gonna float.

And then this...

Beginning in mid-July, Waco River Safari boat tours will launch Panther Island Boat Tours with several types of river cruises from Panther Island Pavilion north of downtown Fort Worth.

Boat tours? Of what? The imaginary island? Launching from the imaginary pavilion on the imaginary island?  Several types of cruises? Cruises? Seems like only yesterday I joked about wondering how long it was gonna be before J.D. Granger and his Confederacy of Dunces added Cruise Ships to their imaginary lake and canals.

And then this...

Shanna Cate, director of the programming and development for the TRWD, said boat tours offer another opportunity for residents and visitors to interact with the Trinity.

Okay, Shanna Cate is the TRVA employee with whom J.D. Granger conducted an extra marital affair, for years, to the chagrin and disgust of multiple TRVA employees, which is how I came to know of J.D.'s Shanna shenanigans.

In the past year, the TRWD general manager, Jim Oliver, acting like that guy in Casablanca shocked about gambling at Rick's, claimed not to have known of this particular instance of workplace inappropriateness, but that once it was known, Shanna Cate was moved out from under J.D. Granger, well, removed from working directly in the TRVA, with another position created for her as the director of programming and development. Also known as party planner.

And now we see a result of Shanna Cate's new position, programming the development of River Tours cruising on the scenic Trinity River.

On a related Shanna Cate note, I thought she was now Shanna Granger. Or did the nuptials between Cate and Granger not take place on that island in the Caribbean last winter as planned? I have heard no details of that event from my on site source known as Deep Moat, who was planning on attending the nuptials. Or is the newest Mrs. Granger going by her maiden name so as to not make so obvious this latest instance of TRWD nepotism?

And then this gem directly from Shanna Cate, with a level of unbelievable numbskullery similar to her former boss, and possible new husband...

“We’re heard so many requests from people who want to be on the water for a leisurely activity with no swimsuit or paddle required,” Cate said. “This will be a perfect complement to our other river activities.”

Oh yes, that is so totally believable. Many requests from people who want to be on the Trinity River without having to touch that nasty polluted water. Is there a record of these requests? Were they made by phone, email, or direct contact? Oh yes, River Boat tours are an obvious complement to their other river activities.

And what would those be? Other than rockin' the muddy river on inner tubes?

We will combine several paragraphs which detail the nature of these imaginary river cruises, including the River Boat tour cruise fares...

The tours will offer some informational and historic perspective about Fort Worth as well as the opportunity to see downtown and other parts of the city from a different perspective, Helm said. The night tour will focus on city lights, he said. The tours will take passengers along parts of the Clear and West forks of the Trinity. “Experiences are vital for residents to offer their out-of-town guests,” Mitch Whitten, executive vice president of Visit Fort Worth. “We encourage all visitors to stay longer and experience more of Fort Worth. “

“This will offer our residents a whole new way to connect with our waterway and learn more about Fort Worth’s natural surroundings,” Rebecca Montgomery, senior vice president of advocacy for the chamber, said in a statement. “The new cruises will be an unique attraction unlike anything else in the region.”

Helm said the goal is to run as many as 10 tours per day on weekends, provided the river is not at flood level. Hour-long tours will cost $15 for adults, $9 for children and $3 for toddlers. Relaxing, two-hour sunset cruises will cost $39 per person and include the option of a meal for additional cost. BYOB will be available on these cruises.

Oh my, these river boat tours will be offering information and historic perspective about Fort Worth. Will they float by the ruins of America's Biggest Boondoggle? Giving the floaters a look at those unfinished bridges? Oh yes, one can easily see how floating on the Trinity River will be giving people an opportunity for a different perspective on Fort Worth. You know, seeing how tacky the town is from a new angle. When they cruise under the Main Street Paddock Bridge will river boaters be able to see the boarded up Heritage Park eyesore as part of their historic perspective on the Fort Worth reality?

So, floating on the river will connect people with Fort Worth's waterway, which as it slow flows through downtown Fort Worth is pretty much a glorified ditch, with multiple dams slowing the natural flow.

These cruises will be a unique attraction unlike anything else in the region? Well, that is probably true. Is there any other town in the region which would instigate something so stupid? Just like no other town in the region was so stupid as to instigate a wakeboard park, which at the time it was foisted on Fort Worth it was also touted with ridiculous hyperbole, much of it from Shanna Cate's husband, or boyfriend, or ex-boyfriend. We just do not know the status of that relationship.

Well, those sure seem like reasonable prices to charge people for the privilege of a river cruise in a scenic wonderland. That night cruise where one gets to see the lights of the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth, that will likely be a real people pleaser for the town's few tourists.

And let's end with one final gem from Shanna Cates...

Cate said the river cruises are already popular entertainment options in Austin, San Antonio and Oklahoma City.

What do popular river cruises in Austin, San Antonio and Oklahoma City have to do with Fort Worth having River Boat tours on a waterway like the Trinity River? I have seen those three other town's water features. Austin has several. San Antonio's is world famous. And Oklahoma City's Bricktown is of a sort Fort Worth aspires to, but is too inept to actualize.

I recollect when I first saw OKC's Bricktown it was still being developed. A HUGE sign touted the bond measure which financed the project. I believe the dollar figure was well over a billion bucks. Imagine that, local voters voting to raise funds to build something the entire community benefits from, and not relying on federal welfare to do so. Or the hiring of an ineptly unqualified local congresswoman's son to run the project, to motivate mom to try and secure federal funds.

Pathetic, pitiful, and sad.

When will this Trinity River Vision madness end? 

Fort Worth's Panther Island Remains Toxic While Tacoma Exemplifies Civic Reinvention

On first glance my one long time reader may see the image you see here and wonder if this is the latest version of America's Biggest Boondoggle's imaginary island.

No, what you see here is real, not an embarrassingly phantom of the sort you can not see in that American backwater of Fort Worth, Texas.

I think that new medication that causes me to say what I really think must be kicking in.

During the same time frame Fort Worth has been boondoggling along, ineptly, with an ill-conceived, incompetently implemented, un-funded economic development scheme disguised as imaginary flood control, the relatively little (population-wise, compared to Fort Worth) Washington town of Tacoma has managed to produce two large developments along that town's actual real waterway of Commencement Bay.

There is the Thea Foss Waterway development at the south end of Commencement Bay, and the Point Ruston development at the north end of Commencement Bay.

Both projects dwarf Fort Worth's pitiful attempt to create a "water feature" for that town. I do not know all the funding details, but both projects did not lack funding in Tacoma. The Point Ruston project is mostly a private development, with some, I assume, public funding.

Both Tacoma projects have elements of the EPA superfund being involved.

Fort Worth's Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District has never been voted on by the public, in an honest, legit way. The project relied on hiring the unqualified son of a Fort Worth politician as the project's executive director, in the hope mom would secure federal funding.

That has not worked out.

Hence Fort Worth's pitiful project, propagandized as a vitally needed flood control project, has been limping along for most of this century, with no end in sight. And with it highly unlikely that more prosperous parts of America will be sending money to Fort Worth to help pay for the town's ridiculous economic development scheme.

Meanwhile in Tacoma.

I saw that which you see above this morning in the Seattle Times, with the article headline From toxic site to green space: New Tacoma park exemplifies civic reinvention.

You can read the entire article to get the entire gist. You who are reading this in Fort Worth and are victims of America's Biggest Boondoggle, read the article and see how many bits of info are not of the sort one would read in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram about the Trinity River Vision.

I will just use the last paragraph of the article as an example...

Dune Peninsula park is every bit the vision presented to Tacoma voters before the 2014 bond election that promised a fresh destination-quality landmark. It is an example for communities throughout Washington of how the legacy of one era can be reinvented as a resource for future ones.

Wow! Imagine that? A real vision presented to a town's voters, in an actual bond election of the sort which happens in modern America, passed in 2014, the year Fort Worth had an idiotic TNT exploding celebration to celebrate the start of construction of three simple little bridges being built over dry land to connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island.

And now, five years later, those Fort Worth bridges are nothing but eyesores, with no end in sight, while in an American town wearing its big city pants the people are enjoying the results of what they approved via the voting method.

What a revolutionary concept...

Anonymous Leads Us To Fort Worth Bridge's Falsework

I know what you might be thinking looking at the photo you see here.

That being thinking that this photo is a look from a new angle, looking at one of the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District bridges, with the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth hovering above one of the bridges which may one day connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island.

Well, you would be incorrect if you were thinking this was one of America's Biggest Boondoggle's bridges which have been stuck in slow motion construction mode since 2014, with the current construction completion date some point in the next decade.

What you are looking at is not a Fort Worth bridge in the making, what it is is an elevated track for a Link light rail line heading into a tunnel in a suburb of Seattle. Which would make that part of the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Bellevue you are looking at. The absence of any old buildings in the photo was likely a good clue this was not Fort Worth.

Bellevue is a relatively new town.

There is a good reason this photo was of interest to me. We will get to that particular "falsework" subject later in this blogging, but first I want to make note of the article in the Seattle Times in which this photo appeared.

The article's title is Don’t derail Sound Transit 3, Seattle and is a classic example of the differences I see in a real newspaper, such as the Seattle Times, and the extremely lame reporting I read in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, about similar subjects, such as local public works projects and the ongoing status of those projects.

The subject in this Seattle Times article is the current project status of the Sound Transit 3 part of the ongoing Link light rail construction in the Puget Sound zone.

One does not read any sort of detailed examination of the current stymied status of Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision public works boondoggle, which the public did not approve of via the voting method, unlike how things actually get done in modern America.

Fort Worth's pitiful excuse for a newspaper has never told its readers what exactly are the design problems which have caused the multiple construction halts to these simple little bridges being built over dry land.

Read the entire Don’t derail Sound Transit 3, Seattle for the full experience of the difference between a Star-Telegram article and a Seattle Times article, and also make note of the dozens of cogent comments on the subject in the Seattle Times.

Back to that aforementioned "falseworks" subject mentioned above.

Last week, Wednesday, May 22, 2019 to be precise, I blogged yet again about Fort Worth's bridge boondoggle, and in that blogging I asked a question about those bridges which generated an interesting question, which, when I thought about it, raised more questions.

First the comment, and then my questions...

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "A Tale Of Two Town's Bridges":

"Why are all those vertical pilings required to help hold up the bridge deck, one can not help but wonder?"

Those supports are called falsework.

Wikipedia says that falsework consists of temporary structures used in construction to support a permanent structure until its construction is sufficiently advanced to support itself.

_________________

So, apparently that is falsework holding up that Bellevue section of the Link light rail under construction. And that is falsework holding up the road deck of one of Fort Worth's pitiful freeway overpass-like imaginary signature bridges we see above.

That looks like a lot of falsework helping those imaginary "signature" V-piers hold up that road deck.

Falsework seems like an ironically appropriate term to apply to Fort Worth's hapless slow motion Trinity River Vision project.

So, is removing that falsework the source of one of the many delays in bridge building? Are the project engineers not sure those imaginary "signature" V-piers can hold up the road deck?

Without Fort Worth having a real newspaper there is no legitimate journalist finding out what the actual problems are which have caused these simple little bridges to be a construction congestion nightmare for years.

I remember in the previous century when the now long gone Kingdome was being built in Seattle. There was a point in the construction where there was this thing called an "O ring", which all the ribs which made up the dome's roof came together. The design called for the "O ring" to be removed with the roof's concrete ribs then coming together in compression, holding the dome up.

The original construction company was not confident this would work, and balked at pulling the "O ring" until further design analysis indicated it would work as planned. Eventually the original construction company continued to balk, and was replaced by a construction company willing to pull the "O ring".

And it worked.

But, myself, and many others, really never forgot that controversy and any time I was in the Kingdome I would look up at the high point of the ceiling, where those concrete ribs came together and wondered what would happen in a strong earthquake.

I have long wondered regarding what sort of foundation those Fort Worth bridge's V-piers are built upon. I don't remember HUGE amounts of dirt being removed and big foundations being poured.

I have also long wondered how it works to have these little bridges built, and then to dig a ditch under them, without compromising the structural integrity of the bridge.

These are the sort of questions the citizens in a town with a real newspaper would get the answer to.

I can't imagine a town like Fort Worth building anything complicated, like a domed stadium, or a transit tunnel, without the project turning into a hapless boondoggle...

A Tale Of Two Town's Bridges

I saw that which you see above this morning in the Seattle Times. Photos taken from atop the Seattle Wheel. The photo on the left was taken January 13, a few hours after Seattle's Alaskan Way Viaduct was closed to traffic permanently. The photo on the right, of the same view, was taken May 21.

As you can see a large expanse of the double decker Alaskan Way Viaduct Bridge is now gone, with areas of Seattle out of the shadows and exposed to sunlight for the first time in over a half century.

Meanwhile in Fort Worth, during the same time frame.

Simple little bridges being built over dry land, with construction beginning way back in 2014, can't seem to make much progress. Month after month with little to show for the money and time wasted.

During that same time frame whilst Fort Worth can't seem to build three little bridges, up north a double decker four lane tunnel was built under downtown Seattle, with the bridge Viaduct it replaced now being quickly removed.

I do not understand these Fort Worth bridges. In the above photo you can see one of the infamous cement V-piers, supporting the makings of a bridge deck. Why are all those vertical pilings required to help hold up the bridge deck, one can not help but wonder?

Is that one of the design stalemates? Is the contractor not agreeing that those V-piers are of a design sufficient to support a bridge deck? Or is the concern what will happen to the structures if that forlorn ditch is ever dug under the bridges, with polluted river water diverted into the ditch, finally giving a reason for the bridges connecting the Fort Worth mainland to an industrial wasteland's imaginary island?

Seattle's Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement project is costing a few billion bucks. The project was fully funded prior to going into dig and build it mode. This is an actual needed project, due to the fact the Alaskan Way Viaduct was an earthquake hazard. And removing this longtime barrier opens the Seattle Waterfront, which is an actual waterfront, not an imaginary waterfront.

Fort Worth's simple little bridges are just one part of what used to be known as the Trinity River Vision, before the name morphed into Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision, or just Panther Island project, or more commonly known as America's Biggest Boondoggle.

The Seattle project has been successfully ramrodded by qualified project engineers.

The Fort Worth project has been ramrodded by the unqualified son of a local congresswoman, a low level county prosecutor with no engineering experience of any sort. He was hired to motivate his mother, Fort Worth Congresswoman, Kay Granger, to secure federal pork barrel funds.

The federal money has not materialized, the hapless project has long been floundering. Yet, J.D. Granger is still being paid over $200K a year, plus perks, and other benefits, such as a cushy job for his most recent wife.

But, this type thing is what is known as the Fort Worth Way. Which, apparently most of the Fort Worth locals are okay with, because they keep electing the perpetrators responsible for multiple ongoing messes, such as non-existent urban planning resulting in actual flooding in areas which actually need infrastructure flood prevention improvements, unlike the area being messed up by J.D. Granger and his co-horts, with claims the project entails much needed flood control where no flood has happened for well over a half century.

This Boondoggle is so bizarrely perplexing...

Seattle's Highway 99 Tunnel Takes Us To Fort Worth's Bridge Boondoggle

I saw that which you see here in this morning's Seattle Times online, an article titled Traffic in new Highway 99 tunnel nearly matches last year’s viaduct use.

Several Texas things came to mind when I read this article. And when I saw the dozens upon dozens of comments the article generated, with that large number of intelligent comments being the norm I note when reading a Seattle Times article.

Meanwhile in Texas.

An article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, about any controversial or interesting local subject, is lucky if a single comment is generated. Is this sparseness of commentary indicative of that sad newspaper's low number of readers? Or what?

Today's Seattle Times article about the new Highway 99 tunnel was the first I have seen since the tunnel opened. I had wondered if I had missed noticing such articles. Possibly there was nothing much newsworthy about the new tunnel, other than the fact it was now open.

The new Highway 99 tunnel can trace its beginning back to 2001 and the Nisqually Earthquake which did a lot of damage in the Puget Sound zone, including damaging the Alaskan Way Viaduct, which the 99 Tunnel has now replaced.

Meanwhile in Texas.

Around the same time an earthquake set in motion some big projects in Seattle, in Fort Worth, on one quiet Sunday morning, the Star-Telegram breathlessly announced that something then called Trinity Uptown was going to turn Fort Worth into the Vancouver of the South.

You reading this in modern America, or Canada, I am not making this up.

Trinity Uptown eventually turned into the Trinity River Vision, touted as being a flood control and economic development project.

Where there has been no flooding for well over a half century.

As the years of the 21st century rolled on the Trinity River Vision went through some additional name iterations, in total the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision.

Which by 2019 has become more commonly known as America's Biggest Boondoggle.

Or simple The Boondoggle.

So, what does any of this have to do with that article in the Seattle Times about the new Highway 99 Tunnel?

Well.

After that 2001 earthquake years of public debate followed regarding how best to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct. By 2014 a solution was agreed to, with funding in place, and an almost $4 billion project got underway.

By getting underway I am referring to the boring of the Highway 99 Tunnel beginning with the world's biggest, at the time, tunnel boring machine, nicknamed Bertha, boring under downtown Seattle.

Around that same time, in Fort Worth, Texas, a big TNT exploding ceremony was held to mark the start of construction of three simple little freeway overpass looking bridges, being built over dry land to connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island.

We blogged about this ridiculous Fort Worth explosion in A Big Boom Begins Boondoggle Bridge Construction Three Months Late.

Soon after that big boom Fort Worth's bridge construction ground to a halt, for over a year. With no explanation, and no legitimate local newspaper of record demanding an explanation.

Meanwhile, during that same time frame, after boring for well less than a mile, Bertha hit a chunk of steel, grinding her to a halt. That tunnel boring halt lasted around a year. The problem was dealt with in an open and transparent way, fully covered by Seattle, and Washington media. And the Washington Department of Transportation (WSDOT) aimed a camera at the Bertha excavation site so people could check in on the progress, 24/7.

To this day no Fort Worth media has provided any specific details regarding the supposed design problems which are now blamed as the reason for the slow motion construction, and ever shifting project timeline, of Fort Worth's pitiful little bridges, now with an astonishing project completion some time in the next decade.

Meanwhile, up in the northwest, modern, part of America, somehow another American town managed to finish a tunnel deep under its downtown. Four lanes of traffic now move through that tunnel. The photo at the top shows traffic entering the tunnel's southbound lanes.

Daily thousands of vehicles are zipping under downtown Seattle in that new completed tunnel. A difficult engineering project, engineering by competent project engineers. Completed in less than four years.

Meanwhile, in Fort Worth, three simple little bridges, which had, way back in 2014, an absurdly long four year project timeline, to build three simple little bridges, are now expected to possibly, maybe, hopefully be ready for traffic sometime during the next decade.

And you can not learn via any Fort Worth media publication, of any sort, what the problem actually is with building those three little bridges over dry land, connecting to an imaginary island, and maybe someday in the distant future having a ditch dug under the bridges, so water can be diverted into the ditch, thus creating that aforementioned imaginary island.

May 4's extremely low voter turnout, and that election's absurd results, have caused many to be of the opinion Fort Worth deserves what it gets; all the embarrassing boondoggles, all the failed projects, all the inept nonsense not worthy of an American town of over 800,000 population.

If only the people of Fort Worth would wise up, and rise up, and boot the Fort Worth Way to being an historical footnote, instead of the town's sad modern day reality...

Panther Island Noise Makes Fort Worth Residents Stark Raving Mad

The Fort Worth local news media of the TV sort continues to report, accurately, realistically, and non-propagandaly (to coin a word which should be one) about America's Biggest Boondoggle, that being the ongoing mess originally known as the Trinity River Vision, before going through multiple name changes before sort of landing on an imaginary island.

Last night a comment to a previous blog post from someone named Anonymous pointed us to another Fort Worth local TV report about yet one more instance of Panther Island absurdity...

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Bridge Contractor Admits Panther Island Project Bungled & Woefully Mismanaged":

Party like a frat boy. The hits just keep hitting the mismanagement. Try this: Fort Worth residents complained about noise at Panther Island Pavilion rave

_____________________

Click the link to the WFAA report and you will see a video detailing Fort Worth resident's disgust regarding the noise pollution assaulting Fort Worth ears as far as 10 miles north of the source, that being some sort of Trinity River Vision sponsored loud music Rave event.

Apparently loud Rave event's emanating from an imaginary pavilion on an imaginary island have something to do with flood control and economic development.

And then this morning Fort Worth's sad excuse for being the town's only newspaper of the daily sort, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, had another article about the problems with bridge construction causing more delays with the bridge building which began with a TNT celebratory explosion way back in 2014, with a then astonishing four year project timeline.

Four years to build three simple little bridges over dry land to connect the Fort Worth mainland to that aforementioned imaginary island. Now with a completion date moved forward to some to be determined year in the next decade.

Today's Star-Telegram article about the Boondoggle is titled Panther Island contractor: Bridge changes could drive up costs, delay project.

The above is an illustrative photo from that Star-Telegram article about the delayed bridge project. One look at that photo and you can clearly see this is one super complicated bridge building enterprise. Not some simple bridge to build, like the Golden Gate (built in less than four years) or other actual signature bridges of world renown.

Some have characterized these bridges as looking like freeway overpasses. That seems accurate. In the photo you can see part of one of those supposedly unique V-piers.

J.D. Granger, and other delusional sorts responsible for causing this nonsense, think those V-piers are some sort of signature design which will give some recognizable style to that future riverwalk which may never come to exist.

In this latest Star-Telegram article we learn of conflicts over serious, dangerous problems with the design between the bridge builder and those responsible for coming up with this bridge design .

The Star-Telegram has repeatedly made mention of design problems with these bridges. But, we never get a single detail as to what is the nature of those design problems.

Curious minds want to know. What is the actual problem?

In this latest Star-Telegram bridge problem article we learn that supposedly each V-pier somehow presents its own unique design problem. Why is each V-pier unique? Is this the first time on the planet a freeway overpass type bridge has been built?

Way back in 2014, we blogged A Big Boom Begins Boondoggle Bridge Construction Three Months Late about that now infamous TNT explosion marking the late start of the building of these hapless bridges in which there is a J.D. Granger quote which now, years later, seems so ironic...

“The two big things you’ll see over the next year are the three bridges coming out of the ground showing vertical construction — in addition to that, a lot of people have been speculative buying of property waiting for the first sign,” J.D. Granger said.

Absurdly after J.D. Granger uttered those words the first year long stall happened with nothing being built showing any sort of vertical construction coming out of the ground.

And really, J.D., you're claiming way back then a lot of people were doing some speculative buying of property waiting for that imaginary vertical sign of construction?

And now, all these years later, basically nothing to show after an astonishingly long project construction timeline which seems to stretch forever further into the future...