Highways in Canada

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

If the bridge doesn't reopen very soon this is a serious national emergency.

We should be mobilizing the military to provide emergency supplies to northern communities. We should also try to negotiate with the US for a temporary removal of the passport requirement for the Sault Ste. Marie and Thunder Bay border crossings until this situation is resolved.

I do kinda agree regarding the removal of passport controls, but that is prone to abuse. That said, commercial vehicles should have passport controls removed if their trip is less than 48 hours and they are only transiting back into Canada via the northern routes.

There is a need for additional options. A 4 lane corridor with 2 separate bridges would help a lot, but a low-standard collector road further north should be constructed as well.

[1overcosc]

Ontario is building a second bridge (making it a 4 lane bridge with each direction a separate bridge) but it's not going to be done until 2017. The decision to build two separate 2-lane bridges instead of a single 4-lane bridge was motivated by the desire for redundancy given how essential the road link is.

Sucks that this happened just a year before the vulnerability is going to be fixed! If this could have waited two years, this would just be a simple lane reduction.

[Stingray2004]

Originally Posted by vid

An expansion joint on the Nipigon River Bridge, carrying Highway 11/17 and connecting Eastern and Western Canada, has failed, dropping part of the bridge by two feet.

Uh oh. That doesn`t look good. Prima facie, doesn`t look like an expansion joint has failed - but rather a 2-foot uplift at the end of the cable-stayed structure itself.

Hopefully, I am wrong.

Edited to add:

Seems like the cable-stayed bridge deck structure drops between the end of the 2-foot uplift and the main tower. And again a bridge deck `buckling effect` on the other side of the tower seems evident. If that`s the case, this may imply pending structural failure.

Again, if that`s the case, the shite has hit the fan here... and alternate bailey bridges may be required as a temporary alternate. Of course, just speculation and conjecture on my part. But man, that pic is unreal.

Am following this one closely to see what has happened. Never heard of same happening to a cable-stayed bridge before. And this puppy is new!

[Mister F]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

• Video Link

Scott must work at Hatch Mott MacDonald..

lol...truer than a lot of people realize. That and the big game between the Roughriders and the Roughriders.

[1overcosc]

One local problem I'm curious about is education.

The village of Red Rock, just east of the bridge, doesn't have its own schools. Kids there are bused to Nipigon, just west of the bridge, for school.

Engineers are said to be escorting pedestrians across the bridge. The poor kids are going to have to get off the bus, walk across the bridge, then get back on to get to and from school for the time being.

[GreaterMontréal]

Originally Posted by mattpa

What happens when engineers from toronto forget its cold for 4-5 months of the year haha. But seriously this is an embarassment they should have never done a suspension bridge those plastic covers crack at -40 same thing happened in winnipeg at our pedestrian bridge on provancher, but it didnt shift like this

pont Pierre-Laporte is a suspension bridge. Quebec City
the longest suspension bridge in Canada and the longest non-tolled suspension bridge in the world.

Constructed: 1966-1970
Main span: 667.5 metres (2,190 ft)
Side spans: 186.5 metres (612 ft) each
Total length: 1,041 metres (3,415 ft) between anchorages
Deck: Six-lane freeway bridge
Capacity: 90,000 vehicles per day
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Laporte_Bridge


Pont Laporte en Smog by Stephane Gendron, sur Flickr

the cold weather has nothing to do with the collapse of the pont de la Rivière Nipigon.

[Tone]

Originally Posted by GreaterMontréal

pont Pierre-Laporte is a suspension bridge. Quebec City
the longest suspension bridge in Canada and the longest non-tolled suspension bridge in the world.

Constructed: 1966-1970
Main span: 667.5 metres (2,190 ft)
Side spans: 186.5 metres (612 ft) each
Total length: 1,041 metres (3,415 ft) between anchorages
Deck: Six-lane freeway bridge
Capacity: 90,000 vehicles per day
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Laporte_Bridge


Pont Laporte en Smog by Stephane Gendron, sur Flickr

the cold weather has nothing to do with the collapse of the pont de la Rivière Nipigon.

Note that this new bridge in Nipigon is a cable-stayed bridge, not a suspension bridge.

I can think of three good examples of cable-stayed bridges here in Québec: Olivier-Charbonneau Bridge (A25), Papineau-Leblanc Bridge (A19) and the new Champlain Bridge.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

• Video Link

Scott must work at Hatch Mott MacDonald..

I think that this story if and when it goes international, will bring some guffaws for those people who think that as a first world country Canada can't be taken all that seriously.

But I'd add that if they do have a point, it's not because of what happened to this particular bridge. That can happen. Shit happens.

What's ridiculous is the fact that there is no other land route.

Also interesting for Canadians in particular (that the foreigners won't likely notice) is the silence from the feds on this.

I checked earlier this morning and not a peep from the feds about the only land route across the country closed indefinitely.

I realize road transportation is a provincial responsibility and they don't want to interfere, but... really guys?

(BTW, pretty sure the feds did throw some cash at Ontario for the bridge project itself.)

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I think that this story if and when it goes international, will bring some guffaws for those people who think that as a first world country Canada can't be taken all that seriously.

But I'd add that if they do have a point, it's not because of what happened to this particular bridge. That can happen. Shit happens.

What's ridiculous is the fact that there is no other land route.

Also interesting for Canadians in particular (that the foreigners won't likely notice) is the silence from the feds on this.

I checked earlier this morning and not a peep from the feds about the only land route across the country closed indefinitely.

I realize road transportation is a provincial responsibility and they don't want to interfere, but... really guys?

(BTW, pretty sure the feds did throw some cash at Ontario for the bridge project itself.)

Absolutely agree with everything you just said.

Canada will rightfully be subject to international ridicule (at least on the late night talk shows) once this story goes international.

I mean, what self respecting G8 country would allow itself to have only a single non-divided highway linking it's eastern and western halves???

Where is Justin on this file? I would think that an emergency cabinet meeting might be in order?

What are the chances that Americans will allow non-passport owning Canadians emergency passage on a route south of Lake Superior? They are not bound to do this, but it would be the neighbourly thing to do. Of course, all the Republican nominees for president would howl over how this exposes their country to international terrorist Jihad.

What a mess......

[SignalHillHiker]

Fart's headline for this was:

CAN ADA

And the comments on Reddit crack me up.

- Getit together, Canada
- We've been separated too long. We're different Canadians now. Leave the bridge broken.

Etc.

I always had the impression the US route was a little longer but faster - not a huge, inconvenient detour. I guess that's only true from farther east, with a final destination farther west.

[sonysnob]

... guys, the bridge has already re-opened.

https://twitter.com/JeffWaltersCBC/status/686545613736030209

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by sonysnob

... guys, the bridge has already re-opened.

https://twitter.com/JeffWaltersCBC/status/686545613736030209

No, a temporary solution while they fix the bridge has been put in place.

If it were open, you could travel both ways at the speed limit.

[White Pine]

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VIA Rail still works... sort of

[shreddog]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

One local problem I'm curious about is education.

The village of Red Rock, just east of the bridge, doesn't have its own schools. Kids there are bused to Nipigon, just west of the bridge, for school.

Red Rock is SW of Nipigon - no need to cross the bridge. That said it is likely that there are a couple school bus routes that did have to cross the bridge (St Helens IR) but likely nothing major.

[shreddog]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

I always had the impression the US route was a little longer but faster - not a huge, inconvenient detour. I guess that's only true from farther east, with a final destination farther west.

From the Soo to Winnipeg it can be a wash as the roads are not fully interstate. The key reason many people take the route is cheaper gas and boredom from the Cdn route (if you've done it many times). The hassle is crossing the border - especially if you're a trucker and you weren't planning on it. To go to T Bay - well that would almost double the time/trip so that would be a real pain.

[shreddog]

FWIW, it may be possible to bypass the bridge as you used to be able to take bush roads around Polly lake to Cameron falls, but not sure if they're still maintained and definitely not fun in January

[sonysnob]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

No, a temporary solution while they fix the bridge has been put in place.

If it were open, you could travel both ways at the speed limit.

Correct.

From what has been released, there was a problem with the expansion joint at the western touch down of the bridge. Cable stayed bridges are cantilieved, so the abutment actually holds the end of the bridge down, rather than holding it up.

It will probably take a little while before they can re-install a proper anchor into the bridge in order to fully re-open both lanes. I'm sure it will take longer to dicipher exactly what caused the failure. ie, was the design not adequate? was it not installed properly? was the steel not constructed properly ect.

Certainly it's not a good situation, but these types of problems occur from time to time. I can think of a handful of structural problems that have come up in Ontario just in the past year or two. Fortunately though, traffic along the TCH is light enough, particularly during the winter time, that there shouldn't be much of a delay associated with the single lane closure.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by shreddog

Red Rock is SW of Nipigon - no need to cross the bridge. That said it is likely that there are a couple school bus routes that did have to cross the bridge (St Helens IR) but likely nothing major.

I meant St. Helens IR. I must have got the towns in the area mixed up.

[1overcosc]

The fact that this is the only road is less ridiculous when you consider how sparsely populated that part of Ontario is.

Completely removing the TCH's status as the only road in the region would require a new road from almost Thunder Bay to just east of Nipigon... that would be about 100km through completely uninhabited bush.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by shreddog

FWIW, it may be possible to bypass the bridge as you used to be able to take bush roads around Polly lake to Cameron falls, but not sure if they're still maintained and definitely not fun in January

Is it on Google maps?