After 5+ years the final EIS for expansion is approved . Here is a thumb nail .
1. A new 2 track bridge will be built NW of the present bridge.
2. The present 1904 bridge ( renovated upgraded in 1940 Just before WW-2 ) will be rebuilt. Article did not mention if rebuilding will commence after new bridge is complete or what. Also no indication if old bridge will be closed for rebuilding. Did say project will take 5 years.
3. Predestrian / bicycle bridge built separately between new rail bridge and road bridge.
4. Ownership of bridge not determined yet.
5. It appears to be a long wait for additional passenger trains DC- Richmond / Charlottesville for VRE and Amtrak ?
Construction expected to take 5 years
https://wtop.com/dc-transit/2018/11/new-dc-va-bridge-plan-would-add-more-trains-bike-paths-over-potomac/
Sorry for the delay in responding -- but thanks to Penny in Kalmbach customer service who apparently got the login bug resolved. (Other prospective posters: if you couldn't log in, clear your Kalmbach-related cookies and try again now...)
Page to the original documents (and links to other resources) is [url=http://longbridgeproject.com/study-documents/here.[/url] Note that some of these links automatically download PDFs but just put up blank pages as they do; don't keep clicking until you check your 'downloads folder' or other location, and look carefully at the convoluted file names as some are very similar. The "Alternatives Development Report" currently marked with New! is the "EIS" (environmental impact statement) document being discussed in the news article, I believe, and the 'section 508' refers to accessibility under the ADA as amended.
I still can't understand just why in the hell you'd need an EIS to replace a bridge that's been there since 1904. Jeez, there's been a bridge there since the Civil War!
What possible impact on the environment is it likely to have it hasn't had already?
Hate to be a cynic, but these EIS's strike me sometimes as nothing more than legalized extortion at most, a con game at least. Someone's making money on it, that's for certain.
And five years to build? It only took the Union and Central Pacific Railroads four years to meet at Promontory Summit! Hell, Julius Caesar's engineers bridged the Rhine in a week! OK, it didn't have to support trains, but you know what I mean.
And it only took eighteen months to build the Empire State Building!
What's wrong here? Someone educate me, please, before I have a stroke!
Firelock76I still can't understand just why in the hell you'd need an EIS to replace a bridge that's been there since 1904. What's wrong here? Someone educate me, please, before I have a stroke!
OK, I will. Let's start with that section 508. And with the whole idea that anything done with the bridge is going to require a long time and a lotta work -- so let's plan the work wisely.
If you are going to 'replace' the bridge, why not solve the longstanding access problem for foot and bicycle traffic over the river at the same time? They studied the alternatives, in light of the provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act to see how to make the foot crossing as open to people as it could be ... and came up with the understanding that it should be separate from the railroad crossing.
Then they looked carefully (it didn't take too much looking in my opinion) and decided that if the Long Bridge is a bottleneck, any in-kind replacement would be almost as much of one. So they leave the old bridge right where it is, not as a trail but as a railroad bridge (who's against that? show of hands, please) and add a new one, slightly offset, with a corresponding new crossing over the adjacent expressway. The new bridge uses some parkland, for which they compensate with a slightly enhanced foot bridge arrangement. Which turns out to cost less overall than integrating it with the new bridge, or trying to stick it on the old one somewhere.
Now write it up and explain all this to anyone interested enough to read all the reasoning. Do you disagree with any of the decisions they have taken, or their reasoning in choosing this out of the considered alternatives? I sure as hell don't, and I'm glad they thought about things.
(Not to disparage those who are concerned with disturbing the environment in the river, etc. -- but note how there's no lobbying, at least not yet, to hold up construction because of unconsidered inhumanity to riparian life... bet you'd hear more if the study hadn't addressed it up front.)
P.S. the example you wanted was that recently-replaced viaduct in New York State, which was built in a time that makes the Empire State Building appear constructed by mob-connected sloths. And that stood from 1885, under vastly increased traffic, quite effectively...
Thank you Overmod, my blood pressure's dropping even as we speak.
Everything you said makes perfect sense.
But five years...
Bet it would not take 5 years if something happened to the present Long Bridge ? The same could be said for the new Gateway tubes under the Hudson river !
OK, if all the planning has been done--turn over actual construction to NS or CSX. It might be finished in five weeks instead of five years.
_____________
"A stranger's just a friend you ain't met yet." --- Dave Gardner
It took CSX the better part of three years to replace the Anacostia River bridges at Benning, DC. Bridges had been attacked and weakened by 'ferrous eating bacteria' in the river itself. Pilings for the bridges had only 25% of the original dimensions remaining when divers inspected them. The Anacostia River is not the width of the Potomac at the Long Bridge location.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.