To me, the Oakland Bay Bridge was always one of those bridges that made you think about bridges when you drove over it. It is very long (one of the longest in the world) and spans an arm of the sea. It is old, and there are earthquakes in the region now and then. So as you drive from one end to the other, it is impossible to marvel that the bridge was even built, and that it is still standing.
A big section of the bridge has apparently needed redesign and rebuild to account for the earthquakes, and this was ignored until the World Series Earthquake of 1989, when planning for a major refitting of the bridge was started in earnest. Subsequently this and other parts of the bridge have been rebuilt. The major changes associated with the Easter Span were finished in early summer 2009. Then, a few days ago, a piece of that new construction broke and fell onto the roadway, damaging a few cars. (Close call … that could have been a lot worse.) The bridge is now closed for repairs.
The reason I mention all of this is simply that there is a very geeky web page available for those of you who are interested in the bridge here, with all sorts of details regarding this incident.
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