Spencer Jack's Dad Takes Me Across Two Of The World's Most Dangerous Bridges

A couple days ago Spencer Jack's dad, my Favorite Nephew Jason, emailed me with the subject line asking the puzzling question "Washington Bridges Dangerous?"

Other than the subject line the only other item in the email was a link to a YouTube video which you can watch below.

This YouTube video purports to show you the Ten Most Dangerous Bridges in the World.

Well.

Two of these supposedly dangerous bridges are in my old home state. I've crossed both these bridges innumerable times, never realizing I was in extreme danger.

One of the dangerous bridges in Washington is that which you see above. The Evergreen Point Floating Bridge. Also  known as the SR 520 Floating Bridge. Also known as the Albert D. Rosellini Floating Bridge.

This particular dangerous bridge is no longer dangerous due to the fact that it has been replaced by a much bigger floating bridge which opened to traffic a short time ago.

The video's narration describing why this particular floating bridge was dangerous seemed way off. As in not factual. This bridge lasted for over 50 years before needing to be replaced for a variety of reasons, mainly the need to be able to handle more traffic and light rail.

The second allegedly dangerous bridge, in Washington, is even more perplexing. That being the Deception Pass Bridge.

The Deception Pass Bridge was a short drive from my home location in the Skagit Valley. I have probably walked across this bridge more than any other bridge in the world.

Over the years a suicide jump from the bridge would make the news. But, there is no way the number of suicides is over 425.

The narrator of the video says the Deception Pass Bridge trembles scarily as vehicles pass over it, presenting a frightening experience to a person walking the narrow sidewalk on either side of the bridge deck.

I do not remember this bridge trembling.

I have blogged about Deception Pass and its Bridge several times on my Washington blog, including...

Deception Pass Bridge Connecting Whidbey Island with Fidalgo Island and July 31 Deception Pass Bridge 75th Anniversary Celebration Picnic and Deception Pass & the Washington State Parks.

And now the aforementioned YouTube video...

A Stormy Floating Bridge Has Me Freshly Perplexed By Official Fort Worth Nincompoopery

Someone reading this who is in the Dallas/Fort Worth zone may be thinking what they are seeing here is an artist's rendering of what it may look like if America's Biggest Boondoggle ever finishes its bridges connecting the mainland to an imaginary island, with the flood diversion ditch under the bridges filled by a flooding Trinity River.

Well, that body of water is not the Trinity River, it is Lake Washington, which would make that bridge the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge, during the Big Blow that blew in a couple weeks ago, on Saturday, August 29.

I suppose I should now turn this into one of our popular bloggings about bridges constructed in less than four years.

Over water.

For those new to the program, the reason we look at bridge building projects, built over water, built in four years, or less, is due to the amazingly embarrassing fact that America's Biggest Boondoggle, also known as the Trinity River Uptown Central City Panther Island Vision, last October, celebrated with a big bang, the beginning of construction of three simple, little bridges, being built over dry land, with a four year project timeline. After which, if funding can be found, a flood diversion ditch will be dug under the bridges.

The propaganda spewing con artists who have foisted this project on the locals have gotten away with claiming the bridges are being built over dry land so as to save money by making construction easier, when the obvious fact of the matter is there will be no water under the bridges until the Trinity River is diverted into the newly dug ditch.

The ditch is not currently being dug because there is no money to pay for it. America's Biggest Boondoggle is not funded in the way most public works projects of this sort are funded, with the funding in place before the project starts, with the project having a project timeline.

America's Biggest Boondoggle has no projected finish date for this supposedly vitally needed flood control and economic development project.

Meanwhile, up north, well northwest, the bridge building project which will replace the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge is well underway. The first of the new bridge's pontoons moved into position on August 11, 2012. The new bridge is scheduled to open in April of 2016. This bridge project is a bit more expensive than America's Biggest Boondoggle's project, with it forecast to cost, when all is done, $4.65 billion. That includes the new bridge, plus improvements to I-5,  I-405 and SR-520.

The bridge the new one is replacing was real cheap. It cost only $21 million in 1961 dollars, around $150 million in 2015 dollars. The original Evergreen Point Floating Bridge opened to traffic on August 28, 1963, taking three years to build. Over water.

I really don't understand why the Fort Worth locals don't revolt against the embarrassing Nincompoopery of their elected officials, like Mayor Betsy Price. Or the Nincompoopery of un-elected officials, like J.D. Granger.

What does it take for the locals to say enough is enough? Is the reason why the locals don't revolt the reason Elsie Hotpepper has suggested to me? As in, way too many locals are un-questioning sheep, willing to follow the leader into floating in an e.coli polluted river?

How have those behind America's Biggest Boondoggle gotten away with the obvious lie that the reason those three little bridges are being built over dry land is to save money?

It is all very perplexing, and I for one do not agree with those who think the explanation is that way too many Texans are poorly educated, and thus a bit ignorant. I think the reason lies elsewhere, but my quest to find the answer really is quite exhausting, and I am not making much headway....

Fort Worth & Seattle's Water Projects

A day or two ago I blogged about what I thought might end up being Fort Worth's all time Biggest Boondoggle, that being the re-routing of the Trinity River through a diversion channel to build what they are calling a Town Lake and some canals, where the hope is people will live, play and eat at restaurants.

The Fort Worth project is called The Trinity River Vision.

Meanwhile, up in Seattle they already have plenty of Town Lakes, most courtesy of Mother Nature. There is no big river that runs through Seattle. But there are canals, with restaurants and residences by the canals.

Seattle is in the midst of a big water project, though. It's a bit different than Fort Worth's. The Seattle project is budgeted at $3.9 billion. The Fort Worth project is expected to cost a bit more than half a billion.

The Fort Worth project includes 3 new bridges. The Seattle project is all about 1 bridge. That being the replacement of the 45 year old Evergreen Point Bridge that crosses Lake Washington and connects with Interstate 5.

That is the current Evergreen Point Bridge in the photo. If you saw Sleepless in Seattle and remember Tom Hank's houseboat, that houseboat is moored just to the lower left of what you're looking at in the photo.

This is a floating bridge. Washington has had 2 of its floating bridges sink. The older the Evergreen Point Bridge gets, the greater the chance a storm will come along and sink it. There are no sinkable bridges in Fort Worth.

In Seattle and Washington there is a lot of public debate and input as to how the new bridge should be designed and routed. In Fort Worth the Trinity River Vision was announced as a done deal with little public debate and no public vote.

I'm guessing that the new Evergreen Point Bridge will be floating long before anything floats in Fort Worth's Town Lake. Or sinks.