By Dan Brekke, KQED News Fix
The new eastern span of the Bay Bridge has been open for three months. It’s still shiny and novel enough that we don’t quite take it for granted. Just this morning, the driver in my carpool was praising the nice wide shoulders on the roadway. But all the disquieting news that came spilling out in March when a crucial set of metal rods started to snap? When’s the last time you thought about that?
Even if most of us have put the broken rods out of our minds (along with later disclosures about problems with the specs for those components, the problems with their manufacture, and lack of testing), the Sacramento Bee’s Charles Piller has not. He’s documented a series of potentially major problems in the building of the $6.4 billion bridge, including questions about inspection of concrete in the span and carelessness in installation of the steel tendons that are supposed to lend strength to its long skyway section.
Piller’s latest story, published Saturday, focuses on continuing questions about whether the bridge officials’ review of the broken rods was sound.
Read the complete story at KQED News Fix.
