9 ms·

Troubled welds on the Bay Bridge

209 points by kevin818 12y ago

vishaldpatel 12y ago
Boy, it'd be great to know more about each commentator before reading their expert opinion on the subjects of project management, procurements, bridge-building, government agency function and anything else relevant to the topic.
jacques_chester 12y ago
I feel that the title is misleading. Caltrans faulted by practicing terrible project management. If someone underbids the next contractor by $250 million on a job they've never done before, you're supposed to politely laugh them out of the room. Edit: for the benefit of those now arriving, the title and link have been changed.
- opendais 12y ago
  Not just the next contractor but the lowest bid by a contractor who has ever built a bridge before. Just in case someone doesn't read the article. ;)
- elnate 12y ago
  I've worked for a company (electronics design/installation) that desperately underbid competitors to get as many jobs as possible, then the boss piles pressure on the workers to get the job done at an inhuman speed. Inevitably, up fucks occur and the boss has a shit fit, you get in trouble and have a black mark against your name. Not fun all around. The lessons, not every job is worth doing and always allow margins for mistakes.
- pijsong 12y ago
  caltrans and california gov ... just way too corrupted
  - saraid216 12y ago
    Accepting a lower bid isn't an example of corruption. This is the equivalent of buying a startup's product on the chance they figured out how to provide value more cheaply. That's not corruption; that's basic market forces.
    - rwallace 12y ago
      If you look carefully at the full text, it's clear the fiasco made no economic sense, and there was bribery and corruption involved.
  - cmelbye 12y ago
    Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
    - dnautics 12y ago
      in this case the administrators are probably not malicious, they are thinking, "I'm doing society a solid... I should be entitled to a due". It's only malicious if they actually have a modicum of introspection.
- techsupporter 12y ago
  > If someone underbids the next contractor by $250 million on a job they've never done before, you're supposed to politely laugh them out of the room. Most of the time, you can't, at least not for government projects. Because of procurement laws and rules (designed, among other things, to allegedly be transparent and to provide accountability), a government body is required to accept the lowest bid from the contractor that met all of the requirements. Seeking an "experienced contractor" is usually seen as code for "we want to use our friends" by a skeptical legislative body, so things like tenure and past projects can't be considered.
  - div 12y ago
    Odd. I've been involved in a few government bidding processes in Europe, and detailing past projects was always a major part of what we'd get graded on.
    - Someone 12y ago
      Indeed. Typically, being able to build the thing is a requirement, and that is typically made objectively measurable by stating that you must have successfully built similar projects. That has its downsides, too. A common complaint in the EU is that there is no way for small building companies to become large companies. Reason is that, to become a large company, you have to do large projects, and to get large projects, you have to have done large projects. In the EU, when comparing offers, one doesn't have to pick the absolutely cheapest that meets the requirements, either. A slightly more expensive offer that more than meets the requirements (for example by having much less environmental impact, by requiring less closure time of a road, or by producing something that has lower maintenance costs) can windhover one that just meets the requirements.
    - dagw 12y ago
      It's part of your grade, but it is rarely an overriding factor in my experience. Lots of experience plus slightly higher price will beat little experience and slightly lower price, but it won't beat little experience and very low price. I was recently involved in a bid for a government contract where we got perfect scores on all factors, but still lost the bid to a small company with little to no relevant experience, but who claimed they could to the job for a third of the price.
- carlisle_ 12y ago
  And the real kick in the balls: >As the project wound down, ZPMC reaped tangible rewards, sharing with ABF more than $250 million in cost overruns and incentive payments.
- acomjean 12y ago
  usually the wording is "lowest bid from a qualified contractor" If the the contractor is not qualified they should be removed from the bid. In NY there was a list of contractors no longer able to bid state jobs that had to be checked as well.
brohoolio 12y ago
Original story - http://www.sacbee.com/static/sinclair/sinclair.jquery/baybridge/index.html http://www.sacbee.com/static/sinclair/sinclair.jquery/baybri... It's a pet peeve of mine when it's really a story about a story.
- dang 12y ago
  Wow, what a difference. Thanks! Submitted url was http://news.yahoo.com/report-chinese-company-faulted-bridge-project-230417237.html http://news.yahoo.com/report-chinese-company-faulted-bridge-....
- clarkm 12y ago
  I really love the progress bar on the top of the page. I wish more long form articles were like that.
  - debaserab2 12y ago
    Lucky for you, it's baked in to every modern web browser in existence - just look to the right for a built in progress bar that even lets you click to a particular section of the article based on it's progress.
    - r00fus 12y ago
      Unluckily for most mobile viewers (definitely on iOS), scrollbars aren't persistent (makes sense when you have limited real-estate). A sign of the times - mobile and desktop client parity in web readership?
    - clarkm 12y ago
      I know it's hard to resist making snarky comments, but you jumped on it a bit too early, and I'm afraid you missed the point. My comment was specifically about It's about the fact that the bar is at the top of the page. It's a completely different user experience than the standard scroll bar.
      - 12y ago
kimjotki2 12y ago
about California's 40% of population have East Asian race affiliation and current voting system unfairly favors such non-uniform population distribution. Immigrants arn't merely confined to ironing your shirts and preparing dim sums, but they're taking over 'important' positions like elected officials. most of such third-world nations don't have a grasp on essentials ideas for functioning, sustainable society (like transparency). It is not a surprise that a Chinese-ridden state picked some suspicious Chinese company for a multibillion dollar project, costing non-Chinese taxpayers $$$.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- carbocation 12y ago
  I don't know if you're aware of this, but your comment seems laden with anti-Chinese sentiment ("Chinese-ridden") that doesn't seem justifiable by facts nor by modern standards of treating other people. First, the demographics of California are not what you state. People of Asian descent comprise ~15% of the population of California, not 40%. Second, is there evidence that the rationale for the selection of the inexperienced company from China was influenced by anything except for nominal cost? Specifically, is there evidence that race was a factor in the company's selection? Perhaps I'm wrong but it seems highly unlikely prima facie. Third, if we accept as fact that third-world nations don't grasp the essentials for running sustainable society (which I don't in general, but will for this comment), then what is the relevance of that to Chinese Americans? I would argue that there is none. Fourth, Chinese taxpayers lost money just as much as non-Chinese taxpayers, proportional to their tax payments. Fifth, phrases like "Chinese-ridden" have no utility except as derogatory terms. Deriding an entire race of people makes absolutely no sense, as your race does not determine your person nor even your culture. Basically, it comes off as racist.
  - malandrew 12y ago
    Nationality, not race. The People's Republic of China is a country of many races. The one race that most people in the US think of when they hear "Chinese" is more specifically known as Han Chinese ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_Chinese http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_Chinese ). This piece is more nationalistic/jingoistic in spirit than racist. Furthermore, countries (and their people) do typically exhibit identifiable differences relative to other countries (and their people). A piece about American-made cars relative to Japanese-made cars probably describes perfectly valid generalizations as the cultures of the countries, companies and people involved are probably markedly different. Had this piece talked about work for hire done by a firm located in the US (or any country besides the PRC) where the owners and most or all of the employee were of ethnic Han Chinese, then you could fairly call it racist, since the focus would then be on their race and not all the attributes (culture, regulatory environment, business practices/norms, etc.) that go along with identifying them by their nationality. I would have found the piece far more balanced had their repeatedly identified the management as "American management", since all the failings of this project exhibit traits somewhat typical of American management styles. It would have been as fair (i.e. statistically valid generalizations based on facts) as repeatedly identifying the source of the goods as Chinese since historically there have been noticeable quality issues with products produced in the PRC relative to countries like the US, Germany, Japan, etc.
crahrah 12y ago
Seems the fact that the company was Chinese is pretty irrelevant - and yet it's repeated over an over. China is the new bogeyman.
- literalusername 12y ago
  Not at all. You apparently didn't read the article. "Caltrans employees and U.S. contractors who supervised the job lived fulltime in Shanghai, and top officials flew there often. Tony Anziano, toll bridge program manager, alone spent more than $300,000 on travel. "Part of that cost was for Anziano’s room at the five-star JW Marriott Shanghai Tomorrow Square for up to $470 per night, according to his expense reports." The travel costs are an obscene waste of American tax dollars. Moreover, the fact that so many tax dollars were paid to a foreign company is offensive. Even if that company was at all competent, it shows a disregard for the American economy. For a project that puts American lives at risk, a demonstrated concern for the wellbeing of Americans is rather important.
  - swampthing 12y ago
    I don't actually find the hotel price to be necessarily offensive in the absence of any other information... in foreign countries, you often have to pay a premium to get American-standard lodging (if it's even available).
    - slashedzero 12y ago
      The idea of requiring (and then paying for) "American-standard" lodging seems ridiculous when we outsource it for developing country prices.
      - swampthing 12y ago
        I don't think people outsource to developing countries because they think they'll get cheaper hotels there... it's more about the cost of the services / goods being delivered.
    - 12y ago
ChuckFrank 12y ago
Having studied in China, and worked in construction, all I can say is that this smells, far and wide, like there was some kickback somewhere in this process. I'm guessing on the Chinese soil end of things. From first hand experience, I know it happens on American soil all the time as well, but, from what little I saw in 1999 the Chinese culture of kickback in China takes it to a whole new level. Also, can somebody explain to me those flight prices? Spending over 10K on flights to Shanghai within a single month seems outrageous.
- jordanthoms 12y ago
  One return flight in Business or First could easily hit that?
  - mikeash 12y ago
    For example, first class round trip from Washington to Beijing is typically about $25,000. Business class is more reasonable, but still high. Economy is already $1,200 or more.
- manifesto 12y ago
  I just searched on Delta.com. If you book a week ahead, the price for a round trip ticket in First/business class ranges from $6,000 to $11,000, so spending 10k in a month is "normal".
  - ChuckFrank 12y ago
    Why would you need to book a week ahead? And why would you go first/business class? It's a huge project, there's got to be scheduled client side meetings, and those should be scheduled months in advance.
    - vacri 12y ago
      The answer to this question: "And why would you go first/business class?" Is this statement: "It's a huge project" Apart from getting far enough along in your career to be handling huge projects and therefore probably entitled to some cream, it also just doesn't make sense from a business point of view - save a few thousand on a flight, but the extra fatigue makes good decision-making harder. Put another way: who should be using business class, if the decision-makers of a huge project shouldn't be?
swampthing 12y ago
It seems like the author is trying to make the assertion that all sorts of poor decisions were made - it'd be helpful to have a comparison to other similar projects, in order to make that determination. Otherwise, these could be completely routine issues for all I know (as a layperson). If you took any software engineering project, and described it by detailing all the mistakes in isolation, it would look like a complete disaster.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- ChuckFrank 12y ago
  The weld is really the key difference here. For welds to be structurally sound, and for them to work in the calculations that have been performed for the structural integrity of the structure, they have to meet a certain standard. These welds didn't. The company said that they themselves would state whether those standards were met. So this would be more akin to a computer chip manufacturer, where every Nth chip is faulty, and then still inserting them into a computer. This isn't about detailing mistakes in isolation. Nor is this about a software program where good enough is sufficient. This is more like the NASA launch controls where it has to be perfect (or however close NASA claims it needs to get to clear a launch program.) Though I'm not sure that answers your question. Since I'm not showing similar projects.
  - dsl 12y ago
    Yeah, the welds are a big deal here. The entire design was done assuming proper welds. When they accepted substandard welds, nobody went back and did the calculations that probably would have shown they needed twice as many supports.
  - angersock 12y ago
    Yep. The big reason that the convenient approximations (lies) we use in mechanical and civil engineering work is that it is expected that the implementer of our designs (elaborate lies) doesn't use the wrong parts--there are exhaustive specifications on things as boring as bolts and threads and welds specifically to ensure that the behavior they exhibit is within the realm of what the designer expects. It's nice to see software engineering practices being backported to more conservative and stagnant forms of engineering. 8)
ChuckFrank 12y ago
What a fiasco. This story just keeps getting bigger and bigger. So many lessons to be learned about a flawed bidding and construction process. And from what I see, it's immune to politics. No party can take the higher ground. Public sector graft and private sector lying, cheating and thieving, both need to be stopped and big, small government, or running government like a business doesn't seem to help. Instead, working towards an ethical and just society with clear and equitable consequences for all does seem to help. So in this case, follow the money, retrieve all that was gotten through ill gotten gains, and hand out jail sentences. As for the rest of us, we still have a bridge to deal with.
- glesica 12y ago
  This is exactly the right attitude in my opinion. Wherever there is money to be made, be it public or private sector, thieves will show up with big smiles and sharp suits on. Consequences are the only thing they understand, and prison sentences are the only true consequences for white collar crime (fines just become a cost of doing business, the only thing you can't get back is time).
  - reedlaw 12y ago
    Unless the fines are 2-3 times the amount stolen. That would cut into the legitimate portion of their income and likely be a strong deterrent.
    - rdwallis 12y ago
      You have a very small chance of being caught if you ride the subway without a ticket. If you are caught some countries will work out what to fine you by multiplying the chance of being caught by the price of the ticket you didn't buy. So if they check your ticket once every 100 times you catch a train the fine for not having a ticket will be more than 100 times the cost of the ticket. That way not buying a ticket works out more expensive than buying one. If you actually want to deter this kind of crime you need to fine the people who are caught the amount of money they stole multiplied by the number of people who don't get caught. So you should probably be thinking 20 or 30 times the amount stolen. Of course such large fines might take entire industries down with them so you're unlikely to ever see corporate crime punished as excessively as it should be.
pijsong 12y ago
i see same thing from my company outsourcing lead development to an indian company
vinhboy 12y ago
"As delays dragged on, Caltrans approved paying the contractors an additional $6.5 million to boost efficiency and quality, and to catalog the work." WTF... I know a lot of us here are contractors. Tell me the last time you got paid MORE because you weren't doing your job.
- _delirium 12y ago
  In troubled projects, where extra money comes from really depends on the structure of the contract and the parties' goals. In this case it sounds like the client is asking for specific things to be done that weren't in the original contract, and is offering to pay for them, because the client wants things done ASAP and thinks this will help get the project un-stuck. The client could instead stick to the original contract and attempt to enforce any provisions in it about nonperformance/delays/etc. But that gives the client less ability to directly specify what measures to take now. (This kind of thing happens in private-sector contracting also, e.g. in relationships between oil firms and platform maintenance companies.)
- bowlofpetunias 12y ago
  Any major IT consultancy company. Especially those working for the government. But the modus operandus is standard even for small agencies. You get to bid for a project. If your bid is anywhere near realistic, there's no way you'll ever get it, because the competition will bid way, way lower. So you put in a bid that you know will never get the project completed and/or will reduce quality well below what will ever be acceptable. However, the contract will be full of loopholes that will allow you to get away with it. You know that once your in, and once the project is far enough along, the client will have no choice but to pay you extra to do what actually needed to be done in the first place. No, the client is not getting screwed. Especially when it comes to governments and major corporations, everyone knows this is going to happen. It's just impossible to get the project started for anywhere near the real price tag. But even on a smaller scale, for instance a web agency with a 20K project, if you put in an honest bid you'll either never get the job or be forced to build crap. From web shopping carts to bridges, people don't value good engineering and planning. Or at least not until they are confronted with the results of bad engineering and planning. So there's the original budget and there's reality, and an entire cult of rituals surrounding bridging the huge gap between the two. And it is this ritual in which people on both ends take a considerable percentage of the top, so all the decision makers are vested in keeping this ritual going despite all of the well publicized failures. If you are a contractor and you're not getting at least 50% more out of a gig than the original contract, you're not playing the game very well.
zaroth 12y ago
Love the pictures of the bridge. The scale is amazing. Wouldn't it be nice if these were projects we could be proud of? It is a little hard to understand how serious it all really is. It sounds like inspections were quite rigorous. Past half way down the article, there's two pictures, one of the internals of a box girder, and right below it, a 10mm crack in a tack weld. I mean, the scale differential of the two images is amazing. I can't imagine cracks in the tack welds make a bit of difference in a bridge like that. The bridge looks incredible.
- aragot 12y ago
  I find there aren't enough incriminating pictures/infography in the article. This kind of technical detail only speaks to people with a mechanics background. For example, a pole will be much weaker if there is an abrupt section change in the middle, even if it's a bigger section. This is counter-intuitive until you learn what the forces look like in metal. Same goes for welding and cracks. Do you know what happens when a 19-ton propeller has a crack? It breaks while spinning and launches the weighted wing at a few dozen m/s. The French aircraft carrier is lucky the wing was sent to the bottom of the ocean [1]. Which leads me to the next topic: Will politicians state that welds are too complicated for them just like computer things? [1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/1325965/French-calamity-carrier-heads-for-sea-again.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/1325...
  - wazoox 12y ago
    > Do you know what happens when a 19-ton propeller has a crack? The story of these propellers is interesting. They were to be cast from a single piece of metal, and were precisely of the largest dimension fit for the largest metallurgy facility in France (because it's a top secret design, they had to be made in a domestic factory). However, the project was so delayed that the factory closed its doors several years before it to be able to build the propellers... So another company got to build them, but they were so large that they had to cast them in several parts and weld them together instead of a single cast, which is apparently NOT best practice and hadn't been ever done before.
- 12y ago
dba7dba 12y ago
The article is focused on faulty management/supervision. It should've focused on HOW the contract went to the Chinese firm in the first place. I'm sure they build find cranes for ports but they never built a bridge. Obviously I have no link to point to or solid proof but here's what someone told me. Hearsay it may be but I will just throw it out there. Initially it looked like a Japanese company was going to get the contract. However after a Californian trade mission to China (headed by ex-Gov Arnold Schwarzenegger) returned, the bid went to the Chinese firm. I was told it was quite unexpected. Not saying Arnold Schwarzenegger was somehow convinced otherwise but I think it's possible one of his advisors were convinced otherwise and than convinced Arnold Schwarzenegger to give the contract to a chinese firm. Hopefully the truth will come out in a formal inquiry. Hopefully.
eots 12y ago
Totally off-topic, but did anybody else notice the chocolate-starfish graffiti on one of the beams pictured in the article?
- jasonrojas 12y ago
  That just made my morning..
- alxndr 12y ago
  I think that sort of graffiti/art for-and-by the workers is common on bridges in the Bay Area, if not elsewhere... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_Bridge_Troll http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_Bridge_Troll
jessaustin 12y ago
I've never been involved in bridge contracts, but all the highway construction contracts I've seen have specified performance bonds sufficient to finish the project in case of problems. I thought this was a requirement for any project that gets federal money (which is effectively any highway project at all). It's surprising that an article this long wouldn't even mention whether the bonds proved sufficient, how much the insurer tried to weasel out of the bonds, whether the insurer insisted on hiring a new contractor, etc. That this topic hasn't even come up, leads me to believe that the state inspectors have completely failed in their duties. With all due respect to Hanlon, the simplest explanation for such total failure is not "gosh they must be stupid!"
- acomjean 12y ago
  I was involved in a lot of state landfill construction (my Civil Engineering days). That Bond was a big deal for a lot of companies. The owners (county and village) were good and wouldn't release payment for work that didn't meet the spec. The prospect of payment or lack thereof is a great motivator. Contractors knew the rules up front and it made our lives as inspectors for the owners much easier. Not that they didn't test you continually to see what they could get away with. These things start at the top. Oragne County landfill Expansion (a landfill they built and then had to stop and restore wetlands) was before my time but companies lost a lot of money on it and it was a good cautionary tale. Google seems to have very little knowledge about it.
- bagosm 12y ago
  That's exactly the question I asked some minutes before you. This doesn't have an answer still? I find it perfectly ok for something to start to corrode but the maintenance work should be there to fix it...
- morganw 12y ago
  no federal money used: http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20110705/wire/107051072#page=0 http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20110705/wire/107051072... "California decided not to apply for federal funding for the project because the "Buy America" provisos would probably have required purchasing more expensive steel and fabrication from United States manufacturers." It's still part of I-80, though. Are there not requirements for the bid process and construction standards independent of funding?
bagosm 12y ago
Ok I have a very serious question that none seems to dress, so I must be missing something. Please I really want to be enlightened because I am puzzled by this. I don't even buy a toaster without some kind of guarantee for the coming years and some kind of maintenance available. Why doesn't the bridge contract have that?
trhway 12y ago
>"Caltrans overrode bridge welding codes" that is my favorite here. Sounds like poetry. >"Tony Anziano, chief executive for toll-bridge work, made at least 64 visits to Shanghai, stayed in one of the city’s most luxurious hotels and spent more than $300,000 on travel during construction." if tales of Chinese corruption and kickbacks is even a bit true (and knowing Russian corruption i tend to believe in Chinese too :) these $300K are juts unrecognizable under microscope peanuts compare to what was most probably transferred to some accounts on Cayman Islands and in some other peculiar jurisdictions.
wil421 12y ago
>The California Department of Transportation agreed to contract the company known as ZPMC in 2006 because it had established a reputation as fast and cost-effective, offering savings of about $250 million compared to the competing bidder. This is absolutely crazy. What kind of person hires a company to build a bridge that usually builds cranes? (A politician) When I was still in college I met a Project Manager who was building a new building for my University. The project was going very wrong because they hired a residential building company to build a commercial building. Dont force a square peg in a round hole. (No amount of money will help it fit)

209 points by kevin818 12y ago

Boy, it'd be great to know more about each commentator before reading their expert opinion on the subjects of project management, procurements, bridge-building, government agency function and anything else relevant to the topic.

jacques_chester 12y ago

I feel that the title is misleading. Caltrans faulted by practicing terrible project management. If someone underbids the next contractor by $250 million on a job they've never done before, you're supposed to politely laugh them out of the room. Edit: for the benefit of those now arriving, the title and link have been changed.

opendais 12y ago
Not just the next contractor but the lowest bid by a contractor who has ever built a bridge before. Just in case someone doesn't read the article. ;)
elnate 12y ago
I've worked for a company (electronics design/installation) that desperately underbid competitors to get as many jobs as possible, then the boss piles pressure on the workers to get the job done at an inhuman speed. Inevitably, up fucks occur and the boss has a shit fit, you get in trouble and have a black mark against your name. Not fun all around. The lessons, not every job is worth doing and always allow margins for mistakes.
pijsong 12y ago
caltrans and california gov ... just way too corrupted
- saraid216 12y ago
  Accepting a lower bid isn't an example of corruption. This is the equivalent of buying a startup's product on the chance they figured out how to provide value more cheaply. That's not corruption; that's basic market forces.
  - rwallace 12y ago
    If you look carefully at the full text, it's clear the fiasco made no economic sense, and there was bribery and corruption involved.
- cmelbye 12y ago
  Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
  - dnautics 12y ago
    in this case the administrators are probably not malicious, they are thinking, "I'm doing society a solid... I should be entitled to a due". It's only malicious if they actually have a modicum of introspection.
techsupporter 12y ago
> If someone underbids the next contractor by $250 million on a job they've never done before, you're supposed to politely laugh them out of the room. Most of the time, you can't, at least not for government projects. Because of procurement laws and rules (designed, among other things, to allegedly be transparent and to provide accountability), a government body is required to accept the lowest bid from the contractor that met all of the requirements. Seeking an "experienced contractor" is usually seen as code for "we want to use our friends" by a skeptical legislative body, so things like tenure and past projects can't be considered.
- div 12y ago
  Odd. I've been involved in a few government bidding processes in Europe, and detailing past projects was always a major part of what we'd get graded on.
  - Someone 12y ago
    Indeed. Typically, being able to build the thing is a requirement, and that is typically made objectively measurable by stating that you must have successfully built similar projects. That has its downsides, too. A common complaint in the EU is that there is no way for small building companies to become large companies. Reason is that, to become a large company, you have to do large projects, and to get large projects, you have to have done large projects. In the EU, when comparing offers, one doesn't have to pick the absolutely cheapest that meets the requirements, either. A slightly more expensive offer that more than meets the requirements (for example by having much less environmental impact, by requiring less closure time of a road, or by producing something that has lower maintenance costs) can windhover one that just meets the requirements.
  - dagw 12y ago
    It's part of your grade, but it is rarely an overriding factor in my experience. Lots of experience plus slightly higher price will beat little experience and slightly lower price, but it won't beat little experience and very low price. I was recently involved in a bid for a government contract where we got perfect scores on all factors, but still lost the bid to a small company with little to no relevant experience, but who claimed they could to the job for a third of the price.
carlisle_ 12y ago
And the real kick in the balls: >As the project wound down, ZPMC reaped tangible rewards, sharing with ABF more than $250 million in cost overruns and incentive payments.
acomjean 12y ago
usually the wording is "lowest bid from a qualified contractor" If the the contractor is not qualified they should be removed from the bid. In NY there was a list of contractors no longer able to bid state jobs that had to be checked as well.

brohoolio 12y ago

Original story - http://www.sacbee.com/static/sinclair/sinclair.jquery/baybridge/index.html http://www.sacbee.com/static/sinclair/sinclair.jquery/baybri... It's a pet peeve of mine when it's really a story about a story.

dang 12y ago
Wow, what a difference. Thanks! Submitted url was http://news.yahoo.com/report-chinese-company-faulted-bridge-project-230417237.html http://news.yahoo.com/report-chinese-company-faulted-bridge-....
clarkm 12y ago
I really love the progress bar on the top of the page. I wish more long form articles were like that.
- debaserab2 12y ago
  Lucky for you, it's baked in to every modern web browser in existence - just look to the right for a built in progress bar that even lets you click to a particular section of the article based on it's progress.
  - r00fus 12y ago
    Unluckily for most mobile viewers (definitely on iOS), scrollbars aren't persistent (makes sense when you have limited real-estate). A sign of the times - mobile and desktop client parity in web readership?
  - clarkm 12y ago
    I know it's hard to resist making snarky comments, but you jumped on it a bit too early, and I'm afraid you missed the point. My comment was specifically about It's about the fact that the bar is at the top of the page. It's a completely different user experience than the standard scroll bar.
    - 12y ago

kimjotki2 12y ago

about California's 40% of population have East Asian race affiliation and current voting system unfairly favors such non-uniform population distribution. Immigrants arn't merely confined to ironing your shirts and preparing dim sums, but they're taking over 'important' positions like elected officials. most of such third-world nations don't have a grasp on essentials ideas for functioning, sustainable society (like transparency). It is not a surprise that a Chinese-ridden state picked some suspicious Chinese company for a multibillion dollar project, costing non-Chinese taxpayers $$$.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
carbocation 12y ago
I don't know if you're aware of this, but your comment seems laden with anti-Chinese sentiment ("Chinese-ridden") that doesn't seem justifiable by facts nor by modern standards of treating other people. First, the demographics of California are not what you state. People of Asian descent comprise ~15% of the population of California, not 40%. Second, is there evidence that the rationale for the selection of the inexperienced company from China was influenced by anything except for nominal cost? Specifically, is there evidence that race was a factor in the company's selection? Perhaps I'm wrong but it seems highly unlikely prima facie. Third, if we accept as fact that third-world nations don't grasp the essentials for running sustainable society (which I don't in general, but will for this comment), then what is the relevance of that to Chinese Americans? I would argue that there is none. Fourth, Chinese taxpayers lost money just as much as non-Chinese taxpayers, proportional to their tax payments. Fifth, phrases like "Chinese-ridden" have no utility except as derogatory terms. Deriding an entire race of people makes absolutely no sense, as your race does not determine your person nor even your culture. Basically, it comes off as racist.
- malandrew 12y ago
  Nationality, not race. The People's Republic of China is a country of many races. The one race that most people in the US think of when they hear "Chinese" is more specifically known as Han Chinese ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_Chinese http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_Chinese ). This piece is more nationalistic/jingoistic in spirit than racist. Furthermore, countries (and their people) do typically exhibit identifiable differences relative to other countries (and their people). A piece about American-made cars relative to Japanese-made cars probably describes perfectly valid generalizations as the cultures of the countries, companies and people involved are probably markedly different. Had this piece talked about work for hire done by a firm located in the US (or any country besides the PRC) where the owners and most or all of the employee were of ethnic Han Chinese, then you could fairly call it racist, since the focus would then be on their race and not all the attributes (culture, regulatory environment, business practices/norms, etc.) that go along with identifying them by their nationality. I would have found the piece far more balanced had their repeatedly identified the management as "American management", since all the failings of this project exhibit traits somewhat typical of American management styles. It would have been as fair (i.e. statistically valid generalizations based on facts) as repeatedly identifying the source of the goods as Chinese since historically there have been noticeable quality issues with products produced in the PRC relative to countries like the US, Germany, Japan, etc.

crahrah 12y ago

Seems the fact that the company was Chinese is pretty irrelevant - and yet it's repeated over an over. China is the new bogeyman.

literalusername 12y ago
Not at all. You apparently didn't read the article. "Caltrans employees and U.S. contractors who supervised the job lived fulltime in Shanghai, and top officials flew there often. Tony Anziano, toll bridge program manager, alone spent more than $300,000 on travel. "Part of that cost was for Anziano’s room at the five-star JW Marriott Shanghai Tomorrow Square for up to $470 per night, according to his expense reports." The travel costs are an obscene waste of American tax dollars. Moreover, the fact that so many tax dollars were paid to a foreign company is offensive. Even if that company was at all competent, it shows a disregard for the American economy. For a project that puts American lives at risk, a demonstrated concern for the wellbeing of Americans is rather important.
- swampthing 12y ago
  I don't actually find the hotel price to be necessarily offensive in the absence of any other information... in foreign countries, you often have to pay a premium to get American-standard lodging (if it's even available).
  - slashedzero 12y ago
    The idea of requiring (and then paying for) "American-standard" lodging seems ridiculous when we outsource it for developing country prices.
    - swampthing 12y ago
      I don't think people outsource to developing countries because they think they'll get cheaper hotels there... it's more about the cost of the services / goods being delivered.
  - 12y ago

ChuckFrank 12y ago

Having studied in China, and worked in construction, all I can say is that this smells, far and wide, like there was some kickback somewhere in this process. I'm guessing on the Chinese soil end of things. From first hand experience, I know it happens on American soil all the time as well, but, from what little I saw in 1999 the Chinese culture of kickback in China takes it to a whole new level. Also, can somebody explain to me those flight prices? Spending over 10K on flights to Shanghai within a single month seems outrageous.

jordanthoms 12y ago
One return flight in Business or First could easily hit that?
- mikeash 12y ago
  For example, first class round trip from Washington to Beijing is typically about $25,000. Business class is more reasonable, but still high. Economy is already $1,200 or more.
manifesto 12y ago
I just searched on Delta.com. If you book a week ahead, the price for a round trip ticket in First/business class ranges from $6,000 to $11,000, so spending 10k in a month is "normal".
- ChuckFrank 12y ago
  Why would you need to book a week ahead? And why would you go first/business class? It's a huge project, there's got to be scheduled client side meetings, and those should be scheduled months in advance.
  - vacri 12y ago
    The answer to this question: "And why would you go first/business class?" Is this statement: "It's a huge project" Apart from getting far enough along in your career to be handling huge projects and therefore probably entitled to some cream, it also just doesn't make sense from a business point of view - save a few thousand on a flight, but the extra fatigue makes good decision-making harder. Put another way: who should be using business class, if the decision-makers of a huge project shouldn't be?

swampthing 12y ago

It seems like the author is trying to make the assertion that all sorts of poor decisions were made - it'd be helpful to have a comparison to other similar projects, in order to make that determination. Otherwise, these could be completely routine issues for all I know (as a layperson). If you took any software engineering project, and described it by detailing all the mistakes in isolation, it would look like a complete disaster.

deleted 12y ago
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ChuckFrank 12y ago
The weld is really the key difference here. For welds to be structurally sound, and for them to work in the calculations that have been performed for the structural integrity of the structure, they have to meet a certain standard. These welds didn't. The company said that they themselves would state whether those standards were met. So this would be more akin to a computer chip manufacturer, where every Nth chip is faulty, and then still inserting them into a computer. This isn't about detailing mistakes in isolation. Nor is this about a software program where good enough is sufficient. This is more like the NASA launch controls where it has to be perfect (or however close NASA claims it needs to get to clear a launch program.) Though I'm not sure that answers your question. Since I'm not showing similar projects.
- dsl 12y ago
  Yeah, the welds are a big deal here. The entire design was done assuming proper welds. When they accepted substandard welds, nobody went back and did the calculations that probably would have shown they needed twice as many supports.
- angersock 12y ago
  Yep. The big reason that the convenient approximations (lies) we use in mechanical and civil engineering work is that it is expected that the implementer of our designs (elaborate lies) doesn't use the wrong parts--there are exhaustive specifications on things as boring as bolts and threads and welds specifically to ensure that the behavior they exhibit is within the realm of what the designer expects. It's nice to see software engineering practices being backported to more conservative and stagnant forms of engineering. 8)

ChuckFrank 12y ago

What a fiasco. This story just keeps getting bigger and bigger. So many lessons to be learned about a flawed bidding and construction process. And from what I see, it's immune to politics. No party can take the higher ground. Public sector graft and private sector lying, cheating and thieving, both need to be stopped and big, small government, or running government like a business doesn't seem to help. Instead, working towards an ethical and just society with clear and equitable consequences for all does seem to help. So in this case, follow the money, retrieve all that was gotten through ill gotten gains, and hand out jail sentences. As for the rest of us, we still have a bridge to deal with.

glesica 12y ago
This is exactly the right attitude in my opinion. Wherever there is money to be made, be it public or private sector, thieves will show up with big smiles and sharp suits on. Consequences are the only thing they understand, and prison sentences are the only true consequences for white collar crime (fines just become a cost of doing business, the only thing you can't get back is time).
- reedlaw 12y ago
  Unless the fines are 2-3 times the amount stolen. That would cut into the legitimate portion of their income and likely be a strong deterrent.
  - rdwallis 12y ago
    You have a very small chance of being caught if you ride the subway without a ticket. If you are caught some countries will work out what to fine you by multiplying the chance of being caught by the price of the ticket you didn't buy. So if they check your ticket once every 100 times you catch a train the fine for not having a ticket will be more than 100 times the cost of the ticket. That way not buying a ticket works out more expensive than buying one. If you actually want to deter this kind of crime you need to fine the people who are caught the amount of money they stole multiplied by the number of people who don't get caught. So you should probably be thinking 20 or 30 times the amount stolen. Of course such large fines might take entire industries down with them so you're unlikely to ever see corporate crime punished as excessively as it should be.

pijsong 12y ago

i see same thing from my company outsourcing lead development to an indian company

vinhboy 12y ago

"As delays dragged on, Caltrans approved paying the contractors an additional $6.5 million to boost efficiency and quality, and to catalog the work." WTF... I know a lot of us here are contractors. Tell me the last time you got paid MORE because you weren't doing your job.

_delirium 12y ago
In troubled projects, where extra money comes from really depends on the structure of the contract and the parties' goals. In this case it sounds like the client is asking for specific things to be done that weren't in the original contract, and is offering to pay for them, because the client wants things done ASAP and thinks this will help get the project un-stuck. The client could instead stick to the original contract and attempt to enforce any provisions in it about nonperformance/delays/etc. But that gives the client less ability to directly specify what measures to take now. (This kind of thing happens in private-sector contracting also, e.g. in relationships between oil firms and platform maintenance companies.)
bowlofpetunias 12y ago
Any major IT consultancy company. Especially those working for the government. But the modus operandus is standard even for small agencies. You get to bid for a project. If your bid is anywhere near realistic, there's no way you'll ever get it, because the competition will bid way, way lower. So you put in a bid that you know will never get the project completed and/or will reduce quality well below what will ever be acceptable. However, the contract will be full of loopholes that will allow you to get away with it. You know that once your in, and once the project is far enough along, the client will have no choice but to pay you extra to do what actually needed to be done in the first place. No, the client is not getting screwed. Especially when it comes to governments and major corporations, everyone knows this is going to happen. It's just impossible to get the project started for anywhere near the real price tag. But even on a smaller scale, for instance a web agency with a 20K project, if you put in an honest bid you'll either never get the job or be forced to build crap. From web shopping carts to bridges, people don't value good engineering and planning. Or at least not until they are confronted with the results of bad engineering and planning. So there's the original budget and there's reality, and an entire cult of rituals surrounding bridging the huge gap between the two. And it is this ritual in which people on both ends take a considerable percentage of the top, so all the decision makers are vested in keeping this ritual going despite all of the well publicized failures. If you are a contractor and you're not getting at least 50% more out of a gig than the original contract, you're not playing the game very well.

zaroth 12y ago

Love the pictures of the bridge. The scale is amazing. Wouldn't it be nice if these were projects we could be proud of? It is a little hard to understand how serious it all really is. It sounds like inspections were quite rigorous. Past half way down the article, there's two pictures, one of the internals of a box girder, and right below it, a 10mm crack in a tack weld. I mean, the scale differential of the two images is amazing. I can't imagine cracks in the tack welds make a bit of difference in a bridge like that. The bridge looks incredible.

aragot 12y ago
I find there aren't enough incriminating pictures/infography in the article. This kind of technical detail only speaks to people with a mechanics background. For example, a pole will be much weaker if there is an abrupt section change in the middle, even if it's a bigger section. This is counter-intuitive until you learn what the forces look like in metal. Same goes for welding and cracks. Do you know what happens when a 19-ton propeller has a crack? It breaks while spinning and launches the weighted wing at a few dozen m/s. The French aircraft carrier is lucky the wing was sent to the bottom of the ocean [1]. Which leads me to the next topic: Will politicians state that welds are too complicated for them just like computer things? [1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/1325965/French-calamity-carrier-heads-for-sea-again.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/1325...
- wazoox 12y ago
  > Do you know what happens when a 19-ton propeller has a crack? The story of these propellers is interesting. They were to be cast from a single piece of metal, and were precisely of the largest dimension fit for the largest metallurgy facility in France (because it's a top secret design, they had to be made in a domestic factory). However, the project was so delayed that the factory closed its doors several years before it to be able to build the propellers... So another company got to build them, but they were so large that they had to cast them in several parts and weld them together instead of a single cast, which is apparently NOT best practice and hadn't been ever done before.
12y ago

dba7dba 12y ago

The article is focused on faulty management/supervision. It should've focused on HOW the contract went to the Chinese firm in the first place. I'm sure they build find cranes for ports but they never built a bridge. Obviously I have no link to point to or solid proof but here's what someone told me. Hearsay it may be but I will just throw it out there. Initially it looked like a Japanese company was going to get the contract. However after a Californian trade mission to China (headed by ex-Gov Arnold Schwarzenegger) returned, the bid went to the Chinese firm. I was told it was quite unexpected. Not saying Arnold Schwarzenegger was somehow convinced otherwise but I think it's possible one of his advisors were convinced otherwise and than convinced Arnold Schwarzenegger to give the contract to a chinese firm. Hopefully the truth will come out in a formal inquiry. Hopefully.

eots 12y ago

Totally off-topic, but did anybody else notice the chocolate-starfish graffiti on one of the beams pictured in the article?

jasonrojas 12y ago
That just made my morning..
alxndr 12y ago
I think that sort of graffiti/art for-and-by the workers is common on bridges in the Bay Area, if not elsewhere... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_Bridge_Troll http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_Bridge_Troll

jessaustin 12y ago

I've never been involved in bridge contracts, but all the highway construction contracts I've seen have specified performance bonds sufficient to finish the project in case of problems. I thought this was a requirement for any project that gets federal money (which is effectively any highway project at all). It's surprising that an article this long wouldn't even mention whether the bonds proved sufficient, how much the insurer tried to weasel out of the bonds, whether the insurer insisted on hiring a new contractor, etc. That this topic hasn't even come up, leads me to believe that the state inspectors have completely failed in their duties. With all due respect to Hanlon, the simplest explanation for such total failure is not "gosh they must be stupid!"

acomjean 12y ago
I was involved in a lot of state landfill construction (my Civil Engineering days). That Bond was a big deal for a lot of companies. The owners (county and village) were good and wouldn't release payment for work that didn't meet the spec. The prospect of payment or lack thereof is a great motivator. Contractors knew the rules up front and it made our lives as inspectors for the owners much easier. Not that they didn't test you continually to see what they could get away with. These things start at the top. Oragne County landfill Expansion (a landfill they built and then had to stop and restore wetlands) was before my time but companies lost a lot of money on it and it was a good cautionary tale. Google seems to have very little knowledge about it.
bagosm 12y ago
That's exactly the question I asked some minutes before you. This doesn't have an answer still? I find it perfectly ok for something to start to corrode but the maintenance work should be there to fix it...
morganw 12y ago
no federal money used: http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20110705/wire/107051072#page=0 http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20110705/wire/107051072... "California decided not to apply for federal funding for the project because the "Buy America" provisos would probably have required purchasing more expensive steel and fabrication from United States manufacturers." It's still part of I-80, though. Are there not requirements for the bid process and construction standards independent of funding?

bagosm 12y ago

Ok I have a very serious question that none seems to dress, so I must be missing something. Please I really want to be enlightened because I am puzzled by this. I don't even buy a toaster without some kind of guarantee for the coming years and some kind of maintenance available. Why doesn't the bridge contract have that?

trhway 12y ago

>"Caltrans overrode bridge welding codes" that is my favorite here. Sounds like poetry. >"Tony Anziano, chief executive for toll-bridge work, made at least 64 visits to Shanghai, stayed in one of the city’s most luxurious hotels and spent more than $300,000 on travel during construction." if tales of Chinese corruption and kickbacks is even a bit true (and knowing Russian corruption i tend to believe in Chinese too :) these $300K are juts unrecognizable under microscope peanuts compare to what was most probably transferred to some accounts on Cayman Islands and in some other peculiar jurisdictions.

wil421 12y ago

>The California Department of Transportation agreed to contract the company known as ZPMC in 2006 because it had established a reputation as fast and cost-effective, offering savings of about $250 million compared to the competing bidder. This is absolutely crazy. What kind of person hires a company to build a bridge that usually builds cranes? (A politician) When I was still in college I met a Project Manager who was building a new building for my University. The project was going very wrong because they hired a residential building company to build a commercial building. Dont force a square peg in a round hole. (No amount of money will help it fit)