3 ms·

> The authors recommend changing policy to report the lowest vertical clearance for bridges, rather than the highest Common fucking sense.

by sintaxi 10y ago

foota 10y ago
I mean, you do want trucks that are able to go over a bridge to be able to go over it.
- yuhong 10y ago
  I don't think it is particularly good design anyway.
  - mjevans 10y ago
    It's a good design for 99% of the time and a very good design from a high speed traffic flow point of view. It requires minimal ramp up to crossing a feature that is nearly at the level of surrounding land. The correct engineering solution is to have diversity of designs, including an 'open top' bridge near by, which can serve the other cases as well as critical backup traffic during the failure. You might note that most of the preventative measures outlined do not modify the design of the bridge, but focus on actually keeping records that track the more critical /minimum/ clearance value, as well as more accurately detecting and reporting to the traveling 'over-sized' vehicle that an abort condition has been reached.
techsupporter 10y ago
> Common fucking sense. No, it isn't, and this is one of the problems when the "general public" comments on engineering things. It's not that people aren't capable of understanding; they lack the experience to understand why something is the way it is. Someone on /r/seattle[0], where this was recently posted, put it more politely than I: === It's because that extra two feet can be valuable when carrying oversized loads. Frankly, this all falls on the driver of the oversized vehicle, the driver of the pilot car, and the hauling company. - The driver of the oversize vehicle is responsible for knowing his load height. A hauler I've worked with before has it in their manuals that the driver must personally measure the load if there is any question. That driver must also stay far enough back of the pilot car to stop in case of a problem. - The driver of the pilot car fucked up royally by missing the sound of the height-verification antenna hitting the bridge. That is a massive error that should see that pilot car driver drummed out of the industry. - The hauling company erred drastically by not pre-running the route, or at least the low clearance segments, to verify where the clearance exists. That is "oversize hauling 101." The article says the state "rubber stamped" an oversize permit. No, they didn't. The hauler certified that the hauler had pre-run the route. It is required that the hauler state that the route has been verified when the permit is issued. "It is the responsibility of the permit applicant to check, or prerun, the proposed route and provide for safe maneuvers around the obstruction or detours as necessary." - WSDOT bridge clearance tool (http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/data/tools/bridgeclearance/ http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/data/tools/bridgeclearance/) 0 - https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/50167q/new_analysis_of_the_2013_skagit_river_bridge/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/50167q/new_analysi...
- TwoBit 10y ago
  What you are saying makes no sense and certifiably wrong because a team of experts recommended changing the standard to ensure min height is always reported, not max height.
  - ghshephard 10y ago
    Both heights should be available. If only one number is to be reported, then yes, report the lowest height. But, for more advanced scenarios, such as electronic Maps, you should report the lane heights as appropriate.
- ghshephard 10y ago
  Pilot car should have backup Radar/Lidar as well as the antenna to detect if no sufficient clearance. Likewise, there should be constant electronic Comms back to oversized load, with deadmans trigger + visual cue if the insufficient clearance height is hit. You can add the (almost certainly to be 100x less reliable) human in the chain if you want, but that should be in addition, not instead of. The Oversized truck should also have an electronic map, which captures cautions regarding height speed issues along every part of the trip. Simple technology, with a bit of process, could eliminate about 95% of these errors that likely exist today. Of course, that 5% will still bite from time to time.

> The authors recommend changing policy to report the lowest vertical clearance for bridges, rather than the highest Common fucking sense.

by sintaxi 10y ago

> The authors recommend changing policy to report the lowest vertical clearance for bridges, rather than the highest Common fucking sense.

foota 10y ago

I mean, you do want trucks that are able to go over a bridge to be able to go over it.

yuhong 10y ago
I don't think it is particularly good design anyway.
- mjevans 10y ago
  It's a good design for 99% of the time and a very good design from a high speed traffic flow point of view. It requires minimal ramp up to crossing a feature that is nearly at the level of surrounding land. The correct engineering solution is to have diversity of designs, including an 'open top' bridge near by, which can serve the other cases as well as critical backup traffic during the failure. You might note that most of the preventative measures outlined do not modify the design of the bridge, but focus on actually keeping records that track the more critical /minimum/ clearance value, as well as more accurately detecting and reporting to the traveling 'over-sized' vehicle that an abort condition has been reached.

techsupporter 10y ago

> Common fucking sense. No, it isn't, and this is one of the problems when the "general public" comments on engineering things. It's not that people aren't capable of understanding; they lack the experience to understand why something is the way it is. Someone on /r/seattle[0], where this was recently posted, put it more politely than I: === It's because that extra two feet can be valuable when carrying oversized loads. Frankly, this all falls on the driver of the oversized vehicle, the driver of the pilot car, and the hauling company. - The driver of the oversize vehicle is responsible for knowing his load height. A hauler I've worked with before has it in their manuals that the driver must personally measure the load if there is any question. That driver must also stay far enough back of the pilot car to stop in case of a problem. - The driver of the pilot car fucked up royally by missing the sound of the height-verification antenna hitting the bridge. That is a massive error that should see that pilot car driver drummed out of the industry. - The hauling company erred drastically by not pre-running the route, or at least the low clearance segments, to verify where the clearance exists. That is "oversize hauling 101." The article says the state "rubber stamped" an oversize permit. No, they didn't. The hauler certified that the hauler had pre-run the route. It is required that the hauler state that the route has been verified when the permit is issued. "It is the responsibility of the permit applicant to check, or prerun, the proposed route and provide for safe maneuvers around the obstruction or detours as necessary." - WSDOT bridge clearance tool (http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/data/tools/bridgeclearance/ http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/data/tools/bridgeclearance/) 0 - https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/50167q/new_analysis_of_the_2013_skagit_river_bridge/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/50167q/new_analysi...

TwoBit 10y ago
What you are saying makes no sense and certifiably wrong because a team of experts recommended changing the standard to ensure min height is always reported, not max height.
- ghshephard 10y ago
  Both heights should be available. If only one number is to be reported, then yes, report the lowest height. But, for more advanced scenarios, such as electronic Maps, you should report the lane heights as appropriate.
ghshephard 10y ago
Pilot car should have backup Radar/Lidar as well as the antenna to detect if no sufficient clearance. Likewise, there should be constant electronic Comms back to oversized load, with deadmans trigger + visual cue if the insufficient clearance height is hit. You can add the (almost certainly to be 100x less reliable) human in the chain if you want, but that should be in addition, not instead of. The Oversized truck should also have an electronic map, which captures cautions regarding height speed issues along every part of the trip. Simple technology, with a bit of process, could eliminate about 95% of these errors that likely exist today. Of course, that 5% will still bite from time to time.