Better Roads

Getting Better All the Time America's structurally defi cient and functionally obsolete bridge count slowly, steadily falling by Tina Grady Barbaccia T hey aren't numbers to throw a party for yet, but once again, the number of structurally defi cient (SD) or functionally obsolete (FO) bridges in America has fallen. Our propreitary 2012 Bridge Inventory survey of 602,154 bridges shows 22.5 percent in the SD/ FO categories, down from 22.7 percent in last year's survey, 23.3 percent in our 2010 survey, 23.7 pecent in 2009 and 24.3 percent in 2008. Reponses show 20.1 percent SD/FO bridges among highway and Interstate bridges (down from 20.3 percent last year). Among city and county bridges 24.8 percent fall into the SD/ FO category compared to 25 percent in 2011, although the total number of city/country SD/FO bridges has actually fallen (but so has the overall total surveyed). Pennsylvania has the highest total number of combined (Interstate/highway and city/county) SD/FO bridges (9,095) ahead of Texas (8,752) and Oklahoma (6,547). Washington, D.C., has the highest percentage of total combined SD/FO bridges at 55 percent, followed by Rhode Island with 49 percent and Pennsylvania with 40 percent. Arizona leads the good news categories with the lowest percentage of combined SD/FO bridges at 10 percent followed by Nevada at 11 percent and Utah at 13 percent. But amid cautious optimism arising from this improvement comes word from states that the new two-year, $105 billion, surface transportation legislation, Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21), which has been faintly praised as a mini-savior for America's transportation in- frastructure, still leaves us with a lack of adequate funds, now and in the foreseeable future, and that shortfall is still a major roadblock to a signifi cant decrease in SD/FO numbers. State Reports John Orbistondo, engineering assistant for the Alaska Department of Transportation, says fund- ing availability remains the state's greatest chal- lenge to lowering its rate of defi cient bridges and the new transportation bill isn't going to make much difference. "Having MAP-21 does no favor for bridges except the NHS [National Highway System] focus," Orbistondo notes in his survey answers. "[It] leaves other bridges underfunded." But, he says, "Over 80 bridges are scheduled for work in the 2012-2015 STIP (Statewide Transpor- tation Improvement Program)" Gary Doerr, bridge management with the North Dakota State Highway Department, also says funding availability is one of the great challenges to lowering the state's rate of defi cient bridges as is "on-local systems." Although Doerr says the state does expect to lower its rate of defi cient bridges this year through "replacements and rehabs," 10 bridges, all local, have been closed this year because of structural failure or collapse. In the last fi ve years, that number is 120 local bridges. Doerr also points out that MAP-21 won't Better Roads November 2012 11

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• Better Bridges: Inventory Improvement- Our annual (since 1979) inventory of Americas bridges. We survey bridge engineers from every state and Washington, D.C., with both quantitave and qualitative questions. The result is rich, up-to-the-minute data and a
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