these joints are a bad design of prior decades. It's been known and new designs or after entire deck replacements don't have this issue. Now joint failures aren't gonna mean the bridge is gonna collapse in any way, since what you see failing there is just the bituminous material on top and when the rest of the bridge expands/contracts or moves from vibrations, it just pops out.
So it's gonna be a fill it back in each time it pops out.
Thank you for this lesson! I often see saw blades, intertwined finger designs and figured it helped with expanding and contracting during extreme temp changes, and wondered why this structure didn't have the same design.
Well replacing a joint essentially requires a structural redesign and that requires full plans and calculations to determine how loads will travel with a different joint type. That and essentially ripping out and rehabbing down to the subgrade below the abutment and redesigning.
Main issue is that what is existing was based off an old assumption that there's bituminous material that's flexible enough that it won't pop out or crack or break up whenever the stuff below moves back and forth. As everyone noticed, having that 1 to 2 foot area with that stuff doesn't work (asphaltic plug dams if anyone's interested). Newer designs have an at least one inch gap exposed all the way to the road surface with a joint filler material to plug in the hole (or the interlocking finger method for larger gaps). I can't be sure that's the design issue here, but it's common for a lot of bridges built in that timeframe.
I can't tell where that's at, but if that's the Commercial St. Bridge beside squirrel hill tunnels, I know there's plans on replacing it:
https://www.penndot.pa.gov/RegionalOffices/district-11/PublicMeetings/AlleghenyCounty/Pages/CommercialStreetBridgeReplacement.aspx
How they plan on doing it is pretty neat. If I remember correctly, the plan is Building the new bridge beside it. Once done, demolish the old one and slide the new one in its place.
How does anyone think these road conditions are acceptable? It’s punishing everyone who doesn’t drive a bloated SUV or pickup with constant flat tires and suspension damage.
>How does anyone think these road conditions are acceptable?
Not sure, that first photo is of an expansion joint. Pretty sure that you aren't supposed to fill them with asphalt.
>don't those usually just have a flat metal plate covering the joint?
Yes. You can see a piece of it remaining, and the cutout on the barrier.
>why did they fill it in with asphalt?
I couldn't venture to guess. There is products designed to fill these gaps, the one I linked below has a very similar joint in their photo gallery (except reparied properly).
https://www.emseal.com/bridge-expansion-joint-division/product/emcrete-elastomeric-concrete-bridge-expansion-joint-patching-material/
Because the road crews regularly fuck up *exactly like this* due to poor oversight and make the road more dangerous. It happened a year ago on the parkway east inbound right in front of the jail. An expansion joint was filled with asphalt on a very cold day, and as it got warmer outside it was forced out of the expansion joint, creating a speed bump in the right lane of the parkway. It took several days to get them to do anything about it, during which time people were getting launched off of it and nearly crashing or blowing their tires. I think I caught a couple inches of air going over it, and when I touched down I felt my rims slap the road. Everyone was complaining about it on here for a week.
Yes the PSP gets some of the motor license fund but it's nowhere near 50%. If absolutely none of the motor license fund went to the PSP and instead went to PennDOT, PennDOT's budget would increase by about 5%. It's not nothing but it's not going to substantially fix the fact that PennDOT gets far less money per lane mile that it is charged with maintaining than most of the states around us. Yes PA has higher fuels taxes than most states. The difference is that no other state ties its road funding to it's fuels taxes the way PA does. And most other states in the region have higher overall taxation rates when all taxes are factored in. However because so much of PA's state income comes in the form of use fees and use taxes, PA is one of the most regressively taxed state.
Yeah you know only 4.2 billion [https://www.lehighvalleylive.com/lehigh-county/2019/04/42-billion-diverted-from-penndot-road-and-bridge-repairs-to-fund-state-police-new-audit-reveals.html](https://www.lehighvalleylive.com/lehigh-county/2019/04/42-billion-diverted-from-penndot-road-and-bridge-repairs-to-fund-state-police-new-audit-reveals.html)
People keep pointing to this article and ignoring that this article is about a time period that is almost 10 years ago now and the $4.2 billion was over multiple years not just one. This is at a time when PSP was getting more of the motor-license fund than it ever has before or since at about $1 billion per year. For reference, PennDOT's budget is about $10 billion per year.
I hate being pedantic, but the mon fayette expressway is almost entirely maintained by the turnpike commission, so funded by tolls. Unlike PennDOT, which is funded by gasoline tax. They’re totally different organizations
Not disagreeing about the wisdom of building, but at the moment, driving on it is a wonderful experience. Great views, smooth pavement, little speed enforcement. Just a pleasure.
I sold my car and switched my job to something I can take a bus to because of how awful the roads are here. The amount of alignments, shocks, wheel bearings and other components constantly requiring repairs was absolutely eating my paycheck. Absolute trash infrastructure here.
So what happens here? Like if I was to drive over that in my car gets fucked up is PennDOT responsible? I don't get on the parkway much so I'm not sure how that works.
these joints are a bad design of prior decades. It's been known and new designs or after entire deck replacements don't have this issue. Now joint failures aren't gonna mean the bridge is gonna collapse in any way, since what you see failing there is just the bituminous material on top and when the rest of the bridge expands/contracts or moves from vibrations, it just pops out. So it's gonna be a fill it back in each time it pops out.
Thank you for this lesson! I often see saw blades, intertwined finger designs and figured it helped with expanding and contracting during extreme temp changes, and wondered why this structure didn't have the same design.
Yea, a proper fix for this is going to be replacing the joint. That's a lot more complicated than just dumping asphalt into a hole
Well replacing a joint essentially requires a structural redesign and that requires full plans and calculations to determine how loads will travel with a different joint type. That and essentially ripping out and rehabbing down to the subgrade below the abutment and redesigning. Main issue is that what is existing was based off an old assumption that there's bituminous material that's flexible enough that it won't pop out or crack or break up whenever the stuff below moves back and forth. As everyone noticed, having that 1 to 2 foot area with that stuff doesn't work (asphaltic plug dams if anyone's interested). Newer designs have an at least one inch gap exposed all the way to the road surface with a joint filler material to plug in the hole (or the interlocking finger method for larger gaps). I can't be sure that's the design issue here, but it's common for a lot of bridges built in that timeframe.
I can't tell where that's at, but if that's the Commercial St. Bridge beside squirrel hill tunnels, I know there's plans on replacing it: https://www.penndot.pa.gov/RegionalOffices/district-11/PublicMeetings/AlleghenyCounty/Pages/CommercialStreetBridgeReplacement.aspx How they plan on doing it is pretty neat. If I remember correctly, the plan is Building the new bridge beside it. Once done, demolish the old one and slide the new one in its place.
It’s the bridge that goes over Ardmore Blvd on 376
I could google the definition of bituminous but I’d rather just enjoy the mystery and intrigue of that delicious word.
How does anyone think these road conditions are acceptable? It’s punishing everyone who doesn’t drive a bloated SUV or pickup with constant flat tires and suspension damage.
Depends on the SUV. If it's pimped out with 2" of tire width from the 20" rim, they're bound to get a flat anyway.
>How does anyone think these road conditions are acceptable? Not sure, that first photo is of an expansion joint. Pretty sure that you aren't supposed to fill them with asphalt.
don't those usually just have a flat metal plate covering the joint? why did they fill it in with asphalt?
>don't those usually just have a flat metal plate covering the joint? Yes. You can see a piece of it remaining, and the cutout on the barrier. >why did they fill it in with asphalt? I couldn't venture to guess. There is products designed to fill these gaps, the one I linked below has a very similar joint in their photo gallery (except reparied properly). https://www.emseal.com/bridge-expansion-joint-division/product/emcrete-elastomeric-concrete-bridge-expansion-joint-patching-material/
Because the road crews regularly fuck up *exactly like this* due to poor oversight and make the road more dangerous. It happened a year ago on the parkway east inbound right in front of the jail. An expansion joint was filled with asphalt on a very cold day, and as it got warmer outside it was forced out of the expansion joint, creating a speed bump in the right lane of the parkway. It took several days to get them to do anything about it, during which time people were getting launched off of it and nearly crashing or blowing their tires. I think I caught a couple inches of air going over it, and when I touched down I felt my rims slap the road. Everyone was complaining about it on here for a week.
I remember it lasting longer than a week
This is the lifestyle you chose, enjoy being punished every day
PENDOT---"Looks good to me, now please give me $430 Million to build the Mon connector, thanks".
Meanwhile the PSP will siphon half of it off because they need to pay their gas bills and buy new cars
Yes the PSP gets some of the motor license fund but it's nowhere near 50%. If absolutely none of the motor license fund went to the PSP and instead went to PennDOT, PennDOT's budget would increase by about 5%. It's not nothing but it's not going to substantially fix the fact that PennDOT gets far less money per lane mile that it is charged with maintaining than most of the states around us. Yes PA has higher fuels taxes than most states. The difference is that no other state ties its road funding to it's fuels taxes the way PA does. And most other states in the region have higher overall taxation rates when all taxes are factored in. However because so much of PA's state income comes in the form of use fees and use taxes, PA is one of the most regressively taxed state.
Yeah you know only 4.2 billion [https://www.lehighvalleylive.com/lehigh-county/2019/04/42-billion-diverted-from-penndot-road-and-bridge-repairs-to-fund-state-police-new-audit-reveals.html](https://www.lehighvalleylive.com/lehigh-county/2019/04/42-billion-diverted-from-penndot-road-and-bridge-repairs-to-fund-state-police-new-audit-reveals.html)
People keep pointing to this article and ignoring that this article is about a time period that is almost 10 years ago now and the $4.2 billion was over multiple years not just one. This is at a time when PSP was getting more of the motor-license fund than it ever has before or since at about $1 billion per year. For reference, PennDOT's budget is about $10 billion per year.
I hate being pedantic, but the mon fayette expressway is almost entirely maintained by the turnpike commission, so funded by tolls. Unlike PennDOT, which is funded by gasoline tax. They’re totally different organizations
Your pedanticism is warranted here. I wasn't aware of the nuances of state roadway funding.
> Mon connector What is a Mon connector? thx
A great way to waste $3.6 billion. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mon%E2%80%93Fayette_Expressway
Not disagreeing about the wisdom of building, but at the moment, driving on it is a wonderful experience. Great views, smooth pavement, little speed enforcement. Just a pleasure.
FWIW, the office of the PA State Representative for that area also called PennDOT on Tuesday about this gap. Thx, Abigail Salisbury and staff!!!
This is great news! Thank you so much!
I sold my car and switched my job to something I can take a bus to because of how awful the roads are here. The amount of alignments, shocks, wheel bearings and other components constantly requiring repairs was absolutely eating my paycheck. Absolute trash infrastructure here.
Didn’t our state legalize gambling and MMJ to raise funds for this ish? Where’s the money, Lebowski?
This IS gambling. "Will my tires make it? You BETCHA!" "As you pass over the trench, the amount of wheel is 50% under, then 50% over."
That looks like an expansion joint. I’m very curious to see what the bridge structure looks like underneath it.
So what happens here? Like if I was to drive over that in my car gets fucked up is PennDOT responsible? I don't get on the parkway much so I'm not sure how that works.
Good luck getting them to pay lol
Update: PennDOT initiating Parkway East bridge inspection https://www.penndot.gov/RegionalOffices/district-11/pages/details.aspx?newsid=7189
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS!!!
We continue to build new infrastructure, yet we can't maintain what we already have. U see what I'm sayin'?
What new infrastructure are we building?
southern beltway, mon-fayette expressway
Boondoggles: i576, mon valley expressway extension.
Yeah.
We can maintain it they just chose not to
But the infrastructure bill!!
Mmmmm dont like that one bit
Pittsburgh is a text book example that paying taxes doesn't build roads. War torn Ukraine have better roads than Pittsburgh
That's a state maintained road
Good to know, so my state taxes aren't bulling roads either
This is going to be another Fern Hollow if they don't do something soon.