Infrastructure Needs

Your editorial “Another Infrastructure Disaster Is Just A Study Away” points out that there is much that Congress can do right now to help improve America’s failing infrastructure (ENR 8/13 p. 56). In “Raising the Grades: An Action Plan for the 110th Congress,” ASCE outlined 10 short-term steps, including those cited by ENR, that Congress could take that would have an immediate effect. Missing from our action plan, of course, was Rep. Oberstar’s proposal to address the backlog of structurally deficient bridges. We enthusiastically support that proposal.

Where we differ from ENR, however, is in our assessment of the National Infrastructure Improvement Act. Without a mechanism to establish a long-term, comprehensive national infrastructure strategy, it is all too likely that in 20 years we’ll again be chasing solutions to the latest disaster. We believe the National Infrastructure Improvement Act will help America deal with infrastructure planning 35 years into the future, when the U.S. population is projected to reach 400 million. ASCE encourages the industry to join the more than 20 national organizations, including the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, that support its enactment.

W.F. MARCUSON III, P.E.
President, American Society of Civil Engineers
Reston, Va.

Idoubt that I have ever seen a more timely editorial than “America’s Aging Infrastructure Is Not a Joke” (ENR 8/6 p. 68). As long as I can remember, funding for our roads, bridges and other critical infrastructure has fallen far behind monies required to keep them up to date. Perhaps a concerted effort from contractors, the general public and publications such as ENR can bring this simmering problem to the surface. The iron is definitely hot.

CHRIS HOTZ
Omaha, Neb

Basic Questions

As a student of construction for the past 22 years, from a framing foreman to project manager in a commercial construction firm handling $30-million-plus projects, your editorial “Bos-ton Epoxy Problem Proves Details Need Scrutiny” is correct in saying that “informed decisions are critical—especially decisions that affect public safety” (ENR 7/23 p. 98). But it supports the wrong supposition that the “devil is in the details.”

Safety can never be compromised when it comes to the traveling public or any end user of any project, so why does the controversy surround the choice of epoxy, performance specifications and project review when the real question that should be asked is, Did we really need the plenum to begin with, and do we still need the plenum? If it was not there it could not fall and no one could be hurt. It would seem that a cast-in-place anchor system tied to the reinforcement in the ceiling at some on-center spacing to accept the coil rod supports could have been a solution. I would hate to think that a project fraught with cost and schedule overruns and pending claim possibilities would allow a choice that was less than acceptable to the safety of the traveling public. But then again, the simplest of choices may have been to evaluate the risk against the safety and not have a plenum.

WILLIAM CORRIGAN
Saratoga Springs, N.Y.