Feds let states delay inspections of bad bridges

Bad bridges on slow schedules
While the extensions were designed for only the newest and best bridges, thousands of ineligible bridges are on delayed-inspection schedules.

Here's how it works: Criteria are negotiated between the federal and state governments for putting a bridge on a schedule for delayed inspection. What gets approved is not a list of bridges, however, but a list of criteria. As conditions of individual bridges change, the rules require states to put them back on the regular two-year schedule.

When msnbc.com compared the federal guidelines to the actual inspection records, we found 1,630 ineligible bridges on the delayed-inspection schedules. Many bridges violated more than one guideline:

• Length: 164 bridges where the longest span exceeds 100 feet.
• Load: 103 bridges with weight-carrying ratings less than the state minimum.
• Low clearance: 27 bridges with clearances above or below the bridge that are less than 14 feet, making them susceptible to damage by trucks.
• Channel: 889 bridges rated below a satisfactory score in channel quality, including the channel protection system, which keeps a bridge from being washed away. These include 733 delayed bridges rated fair, 133 poor, 15 serious, one critical and seven failed.
• Substructure: 134 bridges rated below satisfactory in the substructure, which includes piers, abutments and footings. These include 118 delayed bridges rated fair, 13 poor, one serious, one critical and one failed.
• Superstructure: 107 bridges rated below satisfactory in the superstructure, which includes beams, girders, trusses, cables. These include 95 delayed bridges rated fair, eight poor, three serious and one critical.
• Deck: 265 bridges rated below satisfactory in the deck, which includes the roadway and expansion joints. These include 203 delayed bridges rated fair, 57 poor, four serious and one failed.
• Culverts: 114 culverts rated below satisfactory. These include 94 delayed culverts rated fair, 12 poor, two serious, three critical and three in imminent failure.

• Untried types: Seven bridges of unusual designs with little performance history.

In addition, thousands of bridges violate other criteria that vary from state to state, including the traffic levels allowed on bridges.

'Safety is our number one priority'
Officials from several states thanked msnbc.com for pointing out the problem.

"After Minneapolis, someone was going to ask the inspection question eventually," said Oklahoma's transportation spokeswoman, Terri Angier.

Backgrounder Documents with this series Here, in PDF files, are the state-by-state criteria for delaying bridge inspections: Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Illinois Mississippi Montana New Mexico North Dakota Oklahoma South Dakota Texas Washington West Virginia

Illinois has felt comfortable putting more than 10,000 bridges on delayed schedules because it has relatively good bridges, said Mike Claffey, spokesman for the Illinois Department of Transportation. Although the records show that one out of six bridges in the state is either deficient or obsolete, that's still one of the lowest rates in the nation.

"We believe this program allows us to focus on bridges that are most in need of closer attention," Claffey said. "Safety is our number one priority."

However, in neighboring Wisconsin, where bridges are slightly better, not a single bridge has been placed on a schedule longer than two years.

Claffey also said that Illinois was conservative in selecting bridges for delayed inspections, choosing only those that are rated "good," when the federal guidelines would have allowed delays for bridges that rated a step lower, or "satisfactory."

But the records show that not all of the Illinois bridges on delayed timetables meet the criteria that the state agreed to. The records include 456 bridges that violate those criteria, including some in "serious" condition.

Claffey said that a "computer logic error" allowed these bad bridges to remain on delayed timetables. Those bridges were moved back to two-year schedules after msnbc.com pointed out the problem and are now being inspected, he said.

Rules differ
Why don't all states set their computers to flag any bridge that doesn't qualify for the loophole?

Nearly every state uses bridge-management software called Pontis, which is licensed from the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials. In Arkansas, officials said that their previous in-house software would automatically change the inspection schedule when a bridge's condition deteriorated, but "there are no such internal checks in Pontis. The checks must be done manually," said Randy Ort, spokesman for the Arkansas State Highway and Transportation Department. Association officials said, however, that states have the ability to set the software for such monitoring, although the software doesn't ship with that feature enabled.

Federal authorities say they have checked bridge timetables only sporadically. Although the Federal Highway Administration does not require its district staff to review the entire database to see which bridges are out of compliance, as msnbc.com has done, an agency official said it does periodic "spot checks" for the annual reviews of state inspection programs. Those checks have been optional, not required, said the official, who was allowed by the highway agency to speak only if his name was not published.

Even when the rules for delaying inspections are followed, those rules are negotiated state by state and vary considerably.

Click for related content Part 1: Late bridge inspections put public at risk Which states fell behind on inspections Where the bad bridges are How msnbc.com analyzed the records

For example, the traffic limit. The loophole was designed to be limited to only low-traffic bridges.

But while federal highway officials allowed Oklahoma to delay inspection only for bridges with traffic below 5,000 vehicles a day, they approved a looser standard of 15,000 vehicles a day in West Virginia, 30,000 in Illinois and Colorado, 50,000 in Connecticut, and 100,000 in Washington state, according to approval letters provided to msnbc.com by the Federal Highway Administration under the Freedom of Information Act.

If the strict 5,000-vehicle rule from Oklahoma were applied nationally, the bridge inventory shows 8,590 bridges on longer schedules that wouldn't be eligible for delayed scrutiny.

Or consider erosion control. Inspectors check bridges for scour, the dangerous erosion that can undermine piers. Again, Oklahoma has the strictest criteria, with delayed inspections allowed only for bridges with no history of or present signs of significant erosion. Applying that conservative rule to the nation's bridges, the records show 4,122 bridges on delayed-inspection schedules that wouldn't be eligible.

Finally, the design of bridges eligible for the loophole varies considerably.

Several states took a conservative approach, receiving federal permission to delay inspections only for low-risk concrete bridges or culverts. That's the approach in Arizona, Arkansas, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Texas.

But a much broader list of bridge types was approved for the loophole in California, Colorado, Illinois, Oklahoma and West Virginia. Again, even those relaxed rules have been violated. For example, Illnois reported on delayed timetables 26 old-fashioned bridges made of wood timbers.

Fracture-critical bridges not checked
Federal regulations forbid delaying inspections for fracture-critical bridges like the fallen Minneapolis bridge — the kind with a lack of redundancy in design, so that a single failure in a load-bearing part can cause the entire bridge to collapse.

These bridges aren't necessarily in poor condition, but they're vulnerable. Even a three-legged stool in good condition will fall if one leg is broken.

Yet msnbc.com found 622 fracture-critical bridges in the National Bridge Inventory that are on schedules for delayed inspection.

After the Minneapolis collapse, the phrase "fracture critical" was heard so often that the public may have assumed that states rushed to inspect all their fracture-critical bridges. But most states did not, and federal officials didn't require it.

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