http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/4724996/

exit 3 on the beltline(5th worst), pullen/western bridge(12th worst)

spooky! not really. or is it? how do you all feel?

the stimulus is going to fix stuff like this, no?

3/13/2009 1:23:06 AM

Neither of those surprise me in the slightest.

3/13/2009 2:17:36 AM

Haha, that shit is not spooky.

I have inspected bridges that were spooky with traffic going over them, some of them very dangerous and some of them were broken and in danger of collapsing or suffering from a sort of mini-landslide from a headwall failure. These bridges are not on the priority list because bridge inspections have revealed other priorities and because bitchass politicians have raided the highway trust fund and mismanaged our state's budget, funding, and allowed the DOT (and their contractors) to remain inefficient without any proper attempt at reorganizing.

And if you're wondering how great our inspection program is anyway, we randomly found a pipe culvert that wasn't on any maps and that we had no record of whatsoever (though it was in our jurisdiction). It may have been another year away from falling into the nearby body of water (extremely bad scour, so deep and so far under the road we couldn't quite hit the end of it, at least 15-20 feet deep going up to the edge of the roadway). An urgent action request was put in (this is the bridge maintenance department's equivalent of an emergency), the road had a hell of a lot of rip-rap dumped under it to support it, and the road was put on a list somewhere to be repaved to smooth out the ~1-2" drop that had formed in the road as the culvert started to sag.

I have a feeling you will end up seeing our DOT fighting a losing battle keeping our bridges intact and replacing the bad ones, and one day we'll end up having a bridge disaster that gets people killed. It won't be spectacular like the one up north (the main roads tend to be inspected and prioritized pretty well), but it'll end up happening without a big surge in the state's budget (from a boost in the economy or taxes or massive federal funding nationwide) or some decent political leadership.

[Edited on March 13, 2009 at 3:33 AM. Reason : moar words]

3/13/2009 3:30:19 AM

^I've seen 3 roads washed out because of culvert blockage. Two in the past 3 or so years, and this is just me going about my daily life. It's not like I go around looking for these things.

I know there was one fatality associated with one of the washouts. Not sure about the other two.

And yeah, that bridge over Pullen is terrible. I assume by exit 3 of the beltline you are referring to the actual bridge that is part of the beltline that goes over Hillsboro, not any bridge that forms part of the exit, because I don't remember there being any bridges on the exit/entrance ramps.

3/13/2009 7:31:37 AM

Last I heard, about a year or two ago, the bridge from the Outer Beltline to Ridge Road was awful. Nothing's been done to improve it, but yet, it didn't make the list this year... I wonder what that says.

3/13/2009 8:26:34 AM

Neither surprise me.

When they fix the Hillsborough/440 bit, I hope they fix the entrance to 440 from Western as well, damn left entrance, ive about been hit so many times trying to get on, and have seen countless wrecks there.

3/13/2009 9:25:57 AM

is this one still the worst?

3/13/2009 9:34:00 AM

they need to completely redo the western exit, especially if they want it to be used as the main route to downtown. it is dangerous that there is no deceleration lane if you are trying to get onto in-bound western from 440.

3/13/2009 9:51:41 AM

Quote :

"the stimulus is going to fix stuff like this, no?"

no. there is no budget for it. it's just earmarks and pork barrel projects.

3/13/2009 9:57:52 AM

FIX AVENT FERRY

I'm Big Business and i approved this message.

3/13/2009 10:02:21 AM

This isn't surprising at all when you look at the shear number of cars that use those bridges daily.

The Pullen Bridge doesn't surprise me when you think about how it's used as one of the main roads for NCSU commuters to get to/from the deck. In the morning traffic backs up down Pullen, onto the bridge and into Western. In the evening traffic backs up with people wanting to dumbly make a left onto Western from Pullen.

One possible improvement would be to figure out a better way to increase traffic flow into NCSU from Pullen without having traffic idling on that bridge for hours every day. The left turn lane to go down toward the deck/coliseum is too short, preventing traffic from going around the line.

NCSU has Civil Engineers, go have them prop it up with something for a senior project.

[Edited on March 13, 2009 at 10:09 AM. Reason : -]

3/13/2009 10:08:52 AM

Quote :

"When they fix the Hillsborough/440 bit, I hope they fix the entrance to 440 from Western as well, damn left entrance, ive about been hit so many times trying to get on, and have seen countless wrecks there."

The exits onto Western (both 2A and 2B) from both sides of 440 (inner and outer) all suck.

3/13/2009 2:40:53 PM

Is the fucking bridge going to Wilmington still the worst??

3/13/2009 3:40:44 PM

nah some bridge in guilford co...i remember hearing about it growing up...i think its like only 17 feet up or something and crumbling

3/13/2009 3:41:46 PM

they should let me blow them up so they can build new ones

but i usually dont get many bids with city of raleigh cause it costs too much to do it right

3/13/2009 3:56:30 PM