If you thought that the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge was the real disaster, you aren’t familiar with the government.
Stephen Green at VodkaPundit notes that, “Could it really take twice as long and four times as much money to replace the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge than it did to build it in the first place? The Key Bridge was built at a cost (adjusted for inflation) of about $200 million. Replacing it could take a decade and cost $400 million to $800 million dollars, according to experts in what has become a dismal field.”
It’ll get worse before it gets better. And that’s assuming that it ever does. Estimates for the rebuilding time are stretching out to 15 years already. (And remember the reality will always be worse than the estimates.)
“The bridge originally, it seems like it was about five years from breaking ground to opening up. In 1980, when the Tampa [Bay] Sunshine Skyway bridge had a strike and was destroyed, and then rebuilt with a new cable-stayed bridge, that was seven years. I would consider those lower bounds,” Benjamin W. Schafer, a structural engineer who specializes in steel structures and is an engineering professor at the Johns Hopkins University, said. “I think we’re looking at seven-plus, I would guess 10 to 15 years before — I know that sounds crazy — but before we look back over and we see a bridge jumping over the harbor.”
First, we have to discuss who’s paying for it.
“It’s my intention that the federal government will pay for the entire cost of reconstructing that bridge, and I expect the Congress to support my effort,” Biden told reporters at the White House.
Yet the idea has sparked an immediate backlash from conservative spending hawks, who are already up in arms over Congress’s recent approval of a massive 2024 spending package and maintain that Washington simply can’t afford to pile more money onto the national debt.
“Let’s be clear about the tragedy in Baltimore. That bridge didn’t just collapse. There was no earthquake. The bridge was knocked down (apparently) by a private ship that lost control. Shouldn’t they be at least partly responsible for fixing it?” said Jamal Simmons, a Democratic strategist and Vice President Harris’s former communications director.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Wednesday on MSNBC that she expected insurance payments to cover part of the cost to rebuild the bridge.
It remains unclear how much it will cost to repair the bridge — some estimates put the figure at a whopping $2 billion. But Biden on Tuesday, just hours after the incident, expressed confidence that he can win Congress’s backing.
Biden has provided an initial $60 million to begin clearing the debris. Expect that to be the down payment on a long drawn-out process of filing permits, passing environmental reviews, obtaining DEI buy-in from community groups and politicians, contractors, and consultants looting the giant money box for all they’re worth.
Especially in an incredibly corrupt place like Baltimore.
While the bridge won’t likely be built any time soon, expect there to be some very nice homes being built with that money for everyone involved in the project.
As Michael Caine answered when asked if he’d seen Jaws 4. “I have never seen it but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house that it built and it is terrific.”
The bridge collapse may be terrible, but the houses built with it will be terrific.