When you read this column it will have been nearly one year since the official closure of one side of the Washington Bridge (December 11, 2023). Its handling has demonstrated everything wrong about Rhode Island government and its one-party dominance. Apparently, party loyalty trumps accountability with nary a peep out of the democrats about the continuing ineptitude in handling this crisis. Worse yet, the past seems to be a prologue of the future.

Citizens now know that in 2020 a report was provided to the Rhode Island Division of Transportation (RIDOT) clearly warning of the failure of joints on the bridge unless action was taken. It outlined a course of action to replace the joints with newly constructed deck joints with high quality materials and other fixes thereby extending the life of the bridge another 25 years. It was greeted with a giant yawn while further deterioration continued unabated.

Rhode Island then had the temerity to hire the Barletta Heavy Division company for emergency repairs. The company was already under criminal prosecution for its bridge activities in Rhode Island. Within a short time the “repairs” jumped to an additional $40 million with no end in sight. Another study raised significant questions about the stability of the bridge structure even when it is not in use and cited the decay of the core of the bridge over many years.

The McKee administration then selected Aetna Bridge for demolition despite the fact it was the highest bidder. Shortly after its selection it received an additional $40 million no bid increase.

An initial construction bid request went nowhere until 4 bids were received by November 26.

Meanwhile other “promises “go unfulfilled. Citizen luminaries like Ken Block and Rob Cote, who also uses the expertise of PE engineer Casey Jones, have sounded the warning about the east side of the bridge being used for traffic flow now. RIDOT was supposed to install a monitor system for the now 6 lanes of traffic. It has yet to be fully installed.

Some joints are also deteriorated on the east side, notwithstanding a reconstruction in 2008. It is only listed as being in “fair” condition by federal authorities with some bottom phalanges, among other things, out of sync. Bridges should have a somewhat parabolic camber on the surface to absorb and distribute weight. The east side of the bridge has some significant flattening of the camber.

So far, discussion has centered on the economic impact of the closure and the inconvenience to motorists. As we begin 2025, more attention has to be focused on the safety of the eastbound side. The past obfuscations tossed out by RIDOT hardly give assurances to the public.
Poor maintenance has been the cause of some bridge collapses that should have been prevented with more stringent inspection and maintenance. For years RIDOT was simply lazy, not even removing the layers of sand product used to de-ice roads and left on bridges year after year. When a bridge is designed engineers assume a certain level of maintenance, which has been sorely missing in RI.

Rhode Islanders hopefully will learn from the June 1983 collapse of the Connecticut Turnpike over the Mianus River. The collapse was due to the failure of steel pins that corroded. Deferred maintenance was the culprit. Don’t let it happen here.

Arlene Violet is an attorney and former Rhode Island Attorney General.

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