Big Dig Tunnel Thrill Ride

wtm442 · #1 (**permalink**) 07-12-2006, 12:21 PM

14 Billion dollars .... leaks and falling ceilings ... wow! Now we have a killer car wash. Excuse me, the second killer car wash, other than the Kennedy one.

Now that someone other than a construction worker got killed, a few a$$es will fry. Enough fodder for Howie Carr to really go to town.

... and to think I went thru that section of the tunnel about 6 weeks ago (for the second time), at 5K RPM in third gear. What a sound. Hopefully they do not have me on tape.

The state should just mail a check for about $5M to the family of the lady that was killed, and avoid the expense of a civil trial.

Let the finger pointing begin ....

Ron61 · #2 (**permalink**) 07-12-2006, 12:45 PM

I saw that on the news and wondered why a section of tunnel roof would suddenly fall. Now I know. It was you with all the noise that viberated it and started the cracking. Hope the state doesn't see this and sue you.

Is the tunnel really in bad shape or was this one of those freak things? Wehave one of the main bridges just North of here that they are in the process of getting ready to rebuild as the main freeway crosses it and the other day a car almost fell through. Those trucks coming off the mountain at way to much speed and then wrecking on it have just beat the concrete into huge broken chunks over the years. Now they are falling out and into the lake.

Ron

jams · #3 (**permalink**) 07-12-2006, 12:57 PM

How many tickets for the ride!

wtm442 · #4 (**permalink**) 07-12-2006, 01:37 PM

Shut up and hold on tight. We don't need no tickets ...

trularin · #5 (**permalink**) 07-12-2006, 03:29 PM

It fell because Warren bliped the throttle while going through and the vibration from his huge engine shook the tiles loose.

He did even get a ticket.

Smoking Cobra · #6 (**permalink**) 07-13-2006, 01:12 PM

Year's behind schedule, BILLION's over budget and so many people rich from corruption. KEEP VOTING TED IN!!
If that was my wife killed I would own Ma. and any contruction company involved.

Joeg

chopper · #7 (**permalink**) 07-13-2006, 03:24 PM

Mr Smoking Cobra, how dare you impugn the reputation of the Massive Massachusetts Maritime Moonbat Master? Can't you figure out by now that this was obviously another dastardly attack against one of the enlightened blue states by Dick Cheney and Halliburton? Where have you been????

Even as we speak, the United Nations is thinking of asking for a meeting to discuss possibly trying to take a poll questioning whether or not it would be advisable to entertain a motion to see if it would be politically prudent to convene a hearing on this subject. We should have a French condemnation of decadent American society and 19 resolutions in just a couple of years. Be patient, for Pete's sake; they're drinking second-rate wine and eating bad cheese just as fast as they can!!!

jams · #8 (**permalink**) 07-13-2006, 04:40 PM

I'm no engineer but I would not trust bolts holding up a few tons of concrete over my head.

Ron61 · #9 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 05:41 AM

Jams,

You aren't Ted Kennedy either. Bolts, rather than listening to engineers is cheaper and he can buy more cars to replace the ones he runs into canals and trees.

Ron

jams · #10 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 05:50 AM

You're right. You would think by now Ted would invest in an amphibious vehicle. Say good bye to problems with rivers, canals and all other bodies of water!

wtm442 · #11 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 06:02 AM

2 days ago ... 60 bad bolts
Yesterday 200+ bad bolts.
Today ?????

Better than the stock market

Ron61 · #12 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 07:13 AM

Warren,

Ok, now is the perfect time for you to have Kennedy and the rest of your state politicians start driving through the tunnel to show how safe it is. Of course for Ted, you would need a pond or canal in there for him to feel at home.

Ron

wtm442 · #13 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 09:47 AM

Ted is no dummy. He will just stand back and observe all the finger pointing.

VRM · #14 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 09:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jams

I'm no engineer but I would not trust bolts holding up a few tons of concrete over my head.

I am an engineer and I don't trust a few bolts holding up tonnes of concrete!

We will see if Romney actually does anything. I bet he has more than a few friends who made a bundle on the cost overruns and lousy construction.

Steve

Jamo · #15 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 10:41 AM

Union work at its very best...

BeanCounter · #16 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 11:02 AM

I was at the Hyatt the night the skywalks fell. Bolts don't hold ****.

Bernie

Hmmmm.....is **** someone's password?

Sizzler · #17 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 11:27 AM

How is this even remotely related to Ted Kennedy or democrats in general.

The main contractor is Bechtel, a major contributor to the republican party.

The project is federally funded.

The current governor of MA is republican.

Quote:

Goguen said state Attorney General Thomas Reilly's criminal investigation into the contractors and vendors who supplied the material should steam ahead.

Goguen said the Big Dig's problems stretched back nearly to its inception.

After Republican governor William Weld took office in 1991, the new appointees overseeing the project did not "watch the contractors very well."

For 15 years, the administrative shortcomings of the Big Dig have been clear, but abstract. Monday night, they came crashing down on the heads of a Boston couple on their way to the airport, with fatal results.

The Big Dig's administrative shortcomings include:

The project manager, Bechtel, has consistently acted in its own interests and those of its contractors, not in the interests of the taxpayers and toll-payers for whom it supposedly works.

The Turnpike Authority has acted more like Bechtel's partner than its supervisor.

A succession of Republican governors was more interested in insulating themselves from responsibility for the Big Dig than in accepting responsibility.

A culture of secrecy was fostered, locked in a fortress mentality. The Turnpike Authority treats oversight, transparency and accountability as threats. Over and over again, Pike Chairman Matthew Amorello held press conferences at the Big Dig, assuring everyone that whatever mismanagement or shoddy workmanship was evident, the tunnels were absolutely safe. He was at it again yesterday, only this time he had to explain how a three-ton concrete ceiling panel crushed the life out of Milena Delvalle. aside: sounds like a republican project to me

These shortcomings have led to missed deadlines and cost overruns; the capping of the federal contribution to a project that Congress realized had gotten out of hand; a cost recovery effort undermined by the project managers.

The problems have been visible on the ground as well: Leaks that poured millions of gallons of water in the Fort Port Channel tunnel, breached slurry walls that flooded the Tip O'Neill tunnel; substandard concrete that resulted in federal indictments.

wtm442 · #18 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 11:37 AM

Jamo

Its not the union workers at fault ..... although they will try to blame some illegal worker who screwed up.

chopper · #19 (**permalink**) 07-14-2006, 11:39 PM

"How is this even remotely related to Ted Kennedy or democrats in general."

So you'd have us believe that $14.6 billion was spent on this project and Ted Kennedy, the single most powerful politician in the state and the patron saint of everything union, had absolutely no connection with how that money was spent or who it went to? Get a grip on reality.

From most of what I've read about this project in the recent past, Romney has been trying for his entire term to fire the head of the project and gain some sort of control over it.

According to this site:

http://www.opensecrets.org/news/rebu...iraq/index.asp

Bechtel gave quite a bit of money to the Democrats, too; 59% to Republicans and 41% to the Democrats in 2003. So what does that prove, other than Bechtel is contributing to both parties just like a whole host of other American companies?

jams · #20 (**permalink**) 07-15-2006, 06:13 AM

"Era" by the end of this century we will make tunnels that don't fall on your head!