In a letter to state DOT Commissioner Marie Therese Dominguez, State Senators Rob Rolison, Michelle Hinchey and James Skoufis ask her to share her thoughts on a recent report by the National Transportation Safety Board.
The report identified 68 bridges across the country that still need to be evaluated for their risk in a vessel strike. More than a dozen New York bridges were named, including two in the mid-Hudson Valley: the Newburgh-Beacon Bridge and the Rip Van Winkle Bridge between Hudson and Catskill.
State Senator Rob Rolison, a Republican from the 39th District, says both bridges see a lot of traffic — from the vehicles that cross them and the cargo ships that pass underneath.
“There are significant amounts of river traffic, but also there are ocean-going ships that go up and down the river all the time," says Rolison. "From the Newburgh-Beacon bridge north, many of the same river-going traffic is going underneath both [bridges].”
The NTSB report stems from its ongoing investigation into the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, Maryland last year. The Key Bridge had a structural risk level that was almost 30 times above the federal government’s acceptable threshold when it was brought down by the containership “Dali.” Six people were killed, and shipping to the Port of Baltimore was blocked for weeks.
In a statement to WAMC, NYSDOT says it does not directly own any of the New York bridges listed in the report, but adds “we continually work with our partner agencies to ensure that bridges in New York State are regularly inspected and safe for travel. We welcome the NTSB’s input and are reviewing the report’s recommendations.” The New York State Bridge Authority, which owns the Newburgh-Beacon and Rip Van Winkle Bridges, says it is also reviewing a copy of the report and the lawmakers’ letter.
To be clear, the report does not state that either bridge is in poor shape or at certain risk of collapse — it simply says no assessment has been done with recent data to determine how vulnerable it is to ship strikes. The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, or AASHTO, has a calculation for this that it created in 1991, but most the bridges in the NTSB report were built before then.
NTSB Chair Jennifer Hommendy told reporters last month that the Maryland Transportation Authority never conducted an assessment for the Key Bridge.
“Not only did the MDTA fail to conduct the vulnerability assessment on the Key Bridge, they did not provide, nor were they able to provide, the NTSB with the data needed to conduct the assessment," said Hommendy. "Including: the characteristics of vessel traffic passing under the bridge, vessel transit speeds, vessel loading characteristics, waterway and navigable channel geometry, water depths, environmental conditions, bridge geometry, peer protection systems and ultimate lateral capacity of the bridge piers….We had to develop that data ourselves.”
The Key Bridge was classified as a “critical/essential” structure at the time of its collapse. The NTSB report also considers the Newburgh-Beacon Bridge a “critical/essential” structure for the traffic it sees, while the Rip Van Winkle Bridge is considered “typical.”
In their letter, Rolison and his legislative colleagues ask for a timeline to assess the New York bridges, as well as a list of any steps or reviews the state has already taken.
“To be able to better understand what we’re going to do as a state — whether its the DOT, the Bridge Authority, in conjunction — in addressing those concerns," he adds. "So the motoring public, the individuals who work for the Bridge Authority, work on these spans, have an understanding of what the challenges could be, and how you’re going to address them.”
Rolison says there are multiple agencies at play when looking at shipping safety. For example, the U.S. Coast Guard helps ships navigate where the water is deeper as they travel the Hudson. In its report, the NTSB recommends that the Federal Highway Administration, Coast Guard, and Army Corps of Engineers start a team to guide bridge owners in evaluating and mitigating their risk.
Overall, Rolison says it’s better to be safe that sorry, and it’s important to know where New York’s bridges stand.
“The bridge collapse in Baltimore really raised a heightened sense of awareness on how these things could happen," he notes. "Clearly, things can go wrong.”
Other New York bridges listed in the report include the George Washington Bridge, the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, the Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan Bridge, Seaway International Bridge, Thousand Islands Bridge, and more.
