Wednesday, January 12, 2000
FWW bridge needs a redo
Million-dollar mistake won't hurt taxpayers, drivers
BY TANYA ALBERT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
A mistake on a bridge deck on Fort Washington Way will cost between $800,000 and $1 million to rip up and fix.
But taxpayers won't foot the bill.
Insurance, often taken out on large public projects, will pay for the bulk of the cost. The project team for the riverfront highway project will pay the $250,000 deductible.
The problem: Designers didn't check the weight that steel beams supporting part of a curved bridge deck could handle. When the concrete was poured for the deck leading from southbound Interstate 75 and eastbound U.S. 50 to Fort Washington Way, the deck rotated slightly. Tests showed the bridge was safe for traffic, but the flaw could hurt the road surface's life span.
“This is being done as a precaution and a durability issue,” said Fred Craig, vice president of Parsons Brinckerhoff Ohio, the Cincinnati firm overseeing the Fort Washington Way work. “The public was never imperiled.”
About 175 feet of concrete will be replaced. But drivers shouldn't see a change in their commute, and the work doesn't threaten the August completion date, Mr. Craig said.
Overnight, construction crews were to switch traffic from the northernmost lane of the ramp to a lane that wasn't carrying traffic yet.
The switch maintains traffic while concrete is cut and jackhammered away and then repoured, said Don Gindling, Cincinnati's Fort Washington Way construction manager. The west end of Third Street, near John Street, may be closed while some of the concrete is removed. Work should start within the next week. It will take about a week to remove
the concrete, and new concrete will be repoured when the weather permits.
Fort Washington Way, a $280 million project that involves ripping down the old downtown expressway and replacing it as a straighter and narrower highway, is being done in about half the time a project of that size normally would.
Two beams, not three
To accomplish that, the project was designed in stages. Traffic used half of the old structure while the other half was torn down and rebuilt. Traffic then shifted to the new section. The other half of the old section was torn down and rebuilt to complete the highway.
That contributed to the error: The first side of the bridge poured had two beams. The second side poured had three beams. The three-beam side was checked. The two-beam side wasn't checked and concrete was poured based on calculations for three beams.
The two beams couldn't support the same weight and the bridge deck rotated after the concrete was poured in June. Workers noticed it as they sprayed the concrete with water, Mr. Craig said. It ran off the bridge on the wrong side, meaning the bridge wasn't curved right.
Checking the others
After the problem was discovered, other bridges were checked to make sure similar errors weren't made, Mr. Craig said. The city will not be charged for those checks.
“Although we are not happy mistakes were made, we are happy that Parsons made the repairs and came up with actions that will not affect traffic or affect the budget,” Mr. Gindling said.
Mr. Craig would not identify the contractor that made the mistake.
FWW bridge needs a redo
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