San Francisco East Bay Commute

[Guest]

As a former long time resident of San Francisco, let me commiserate with those who commute from the East Bay to San Francisco. Yesterdays collapse of a ramp leading to the Bay Bridge is going to snarl commutes for weeks, if not months to come.

Even if you normally commute by BART, the added people to the trains and for a few days, the newbies cluelessness at buying tickets etc. is going to make your commute hell. The already tight parking at BART stations is about to get really bad.

For those coming from the South part of the East Bay (San Leandro, Hayward etc.) you're going to have all those coming from the North (Berkley, Emeryville etc.) merging in to your flow. And Oakland residents are going to have their cities street filled by those people trying to get down to merge into the access to the bridge.

San Mateo & Dumbarton Bridge users will find additional traffic on their bridges too as those who can find an alternative to the Bay Bridge go to South to those bridges.

The worst commute in the nation, is going to be a whole lot worse for millions of people.

What's more, people there already have incredibly long commutes in some cases, since you often have to buy houses two hours away, to get your mortgage payments under $4,000 a month.

And they'll sit in that traffic burning $3.30 a gallon gasoline.

I can hear Rush Limbaugh now saying its God's revenge for their liberalism.

 

[Trombonus]

Thanks God I don't live in Hayward anymore, at least not for the moment. I'll be heading back there this summer for classes though. That's going to suck big time.

Still, I'm just glad no one got hurt. Even the driver got away with some second degree burns. This situation could have been much MUCH worse. My best friend lives in Oakland, so this was a concern for me when I first heard about it. I was pretty sure he'd be ok, but there's always that tiny sliver of doubt and fear when something like this happens and you don't know the full story.

Anyway, it didn't stop the Warriors from beating the Mavericks and going up 3 games to 1 in that series, so it's all good for now.

 

[3113]

For those not aware of the news...it's pretty freaky!:

Tanker fire destroys part of MacArthur Maze

(04-29) 18:03 PDT OAKLAND -- Huge leaping flames from an exploding gasoline tanker melted the steel underbelly of a highway overpass in the East Bay's MacArthur Maze early this morning, causing it to collapse onto the roadway below and virtually ensuring major traffic problems for weeks to come.

The elevated roadway that fell carried eastbound traffic from the Bay Bridge onto Interstates 580 and 980 and state Highway 24. It draped like a blanket over a roadway below, a connector from southbound I-80 to I-880 that also was severely damaged.

The single-vehicle crash occurred on the lower roadway when the tanker, loaded with 8,600 gallons of unleaded gasoline and heading from a refinery in Benicia to a gas station on Hegenberger Road in Oakland, hit a guardrail at 3:41 a.m. Engineers said the green steel frame of the I-580 overpass and the bolts holding the frame together began to melt and bend in the intense heat-- and that movement pulled the roadbed off its supports.

California Highway Patrol spokesman Trent Cross said the driver of the tanker, James Mosqueda, 51, of Woodland (Yolo County), was traveling too fast in a 50 mph zone when his truck overturned and burst into flames.

Mosqueda, an employee of Sabek Transportation in San Francisco for 10 months, got out of the truck on his own after it overturned and hailed a taxi that took him to Kaiser Hospital in Oakland, witnesses and police said. He has been transferred to the burn unit at St. Francis Hospital in San Francisco, where his father said he was "doing OK" this afternoon, having sustained burns on his face, neck and hands. The family expected Mosqueda to remain hospitalalized two or three more days.

Cross said Mosqueda had a valid driver's license and there is no indication he was under the influence of alcohol or drugs when he crashed. Oakland firefighters, the first public safety workers on the scene, arrived with two engines at 3:55 a.m., Capt. Cedric Price said.

"We didn't know it was a tanker truck that was involved. As soon as that was established we immediately upgraded to a large scale incident response team and added two more engines and two trucks," Price said.

Firefighters immediately noticed the upper connector ramp was buckling and seven minutes after they arrived -- at 4:02 a.m. -- it collapsed, Price said. Now there were no more structures threatened, the firefighters' approach shifted.

"With no structures or lives in jeopardy and with 8,000 gallons of flammable fuel involved, you're basically better off letting it burn itself out," said Price.

Firefighters used only water to control the blaze, which took about two hours, he said. Had there been lives at risk, firefighters would have used foam to fight the blaze, but it would have run off into the nearby Bay water, polluting it. "That this didn't happen on a weekday morning might have been the only beauty of it," said Price.

With the help of protective gear and breathing devices, firefighter exposure to the fumes was minimal, according to Price. A total of 29 Oakland Fire Department personnel were on scene as well as one engine from Emeryville. A smaller crew of Oakland firefighters remained there through the early evening to watch for potential dangers.

Jennifer Summers, 36, was driving from her costume design job in San Francisco home to the Oakland hills just before 4 a.m. when she saw black smoke and realized the freeway was on fire. She quickly pulled off and looped around so she could see what was going on. When she got out of her car, flames were shooting into the sky over multiple layers of freeway and she could hear loud crackling and explosions. "There were bright, bright orange flames and they were huge," said Summers. "There were cars driving through the flames. The first cars slowed down like they didn't know what to do and then kept going. I was shocked."

Summers said dozens of vehicles stopped to watch the spectacle, which ended with a horrendous crash as the freeway collapsed in a torrent of fire and rubble."There was nothing you could do," she said. "I'm thinking, 'Oh my God, this is going to be a nightmare with the traffic problems we already have.' "

Isaac Rodriguez, a 53-year-old sanitation supervisor who works the graveyard shift at East Bay Municipal Utility District's sewage treatment plant, said his supervisor called him about 3:45 a.m. and told him to leave work because of a nearby explosion.

Rodriguez went outside with a co-worker and saw the I-880 connector about 50 feet above him engulfed in fire with flames leaping up to the I-580 connector above that.
"It was massive," Rodriguez said. "I saw movement and there was a man up there. I started talking to the guy. Are you the truck driver? 'Yes.' He said, 'I'm burned. I got out as soon as I could.' ''

The driver seemed disoriented. "It looked at one time he was walking toward the truck again. I believe he was in shock,'' Rodriguez said. Rodriguez said he regretted not thinking to send a vehicle up to get the injured man. He and a coworker stood for some 40 minutes watching the freeway burn.

"It looked like a big slab of plastic because it was melted. It's made of steel and concrete and it was bent at both angles of the pillar. It really looked fake. ... It was an event last night that I'm not going to forget for a long time. It was incredible because it was a roar.

No sign of the truck remains at the scene. One Caltrans worker there early this morning held up his thumb and forefinger an inch apart to describe how big the tanker is now.

John Goodwin, a spokesman for the regional Metropolitan Transportation Commission, said the maze is one of the worst spots for traffic in the Bay Area. "Westbound 80 is already the most congested route in the Bay Area, and it has been for many years," said Goodwin. "Also, the route coming off the Bay Bridge eastbound from Treasure Island is number 10 on the regional congestion list, and with 580 gone there will be a huge impact on that already-congested route."

..."This really strikes at the very center of the Bay Area freeway network," he said, predicting the closure of the two overpassess will "have a ripple effect" across the region. "It will put more traffic on the San Mateo Bridge, the Golden Gate and the Richmond-San Rafael bridge," Goodwin said.

Some 35,000 cars travel the two-lane I-880 connector each day, and 45,000 cars use the I-580 connector, which is three lanes, said Caltrans Director Will Kempton.
Kempton said rebuilding the I-580 connector will cost tens of millions of dollars. The extent of the damage to the I-880 connector cannot be determined, he said, until the debris is cleared off. "Initial indications are that it has been severely damaged," Kempton said "It will obviously need some work."

http://www.gulfnews.com/images/07/04/30/30_wd_US_highway_AP_4.jpghttp://www.gulfnews.com/images/07/04/30/30_wd_highway_4.jpg

 

[Trombonus]

Yeah, it was pretty crazy. I mean, the fire was so intense that the overpass literally melted. You can see it in the pics. It's like the thing was made out of play dough or something, not concrete and metal.

 

[3113]

Yeah, it was pretty crazy. I mean, the fire was so intense that the overpass literally melted. You can see it in the pics. It's like the thing was made out of play dough or something, not concrete and metal.

I suspect Transformers were behind it

 

[Trombonus]

I suspect Transformers were behind it

 

[Boxlicker101]

I lived in the Bay Area for 44 years, but most of the time I lived and worked in the East Bay or San Jose. It will be a mess, alright, but not as bad as after the Loma Prieta Earthquake in 1989. Besides causing a lengthy delay of Game 3 of the World Series, it messed up commuting by closing the Bay Bridge to SF. At least now, people will be able to use other appeoaches to the bridge.

By the way, I believe that was the only major sports event in the US that was ever delayed by earthquake.

There is a minor plus to this. It might silence those who claim that 9-11 was an inside job, that the WTC was brought down by explosives inside the buildings. It has been proven again that flaming fuel oil, such as what was in the airline fuel tanks, can melt structural steel, even when the metal is inside concrete.

 

[Guest]

There is a minor plus to this. It might silence those who claim that 9-11 was an inside job, that the WTC was brought down by explosives inside the buildings. It has been proven again that flaming fuel oil, such as what was in the airline fuel tanks, can melt structural steel, even when the metal is inside concrete.

But a friend of a friend, of a guy who knew a guy I once saw at a distance said Cheney was seen fleeing the scene of this truck wreck!!!!

 

[3113]

But a friend of a friend, of a guy who knew a guy I once saw at a distance said Cheney was seen fleeing the scene of this truck wreck!!!!

Cheney is a Transformer. He wrecked the truck while in his other guise as a Cadillac Escalade.

 

[Vincent E]

It might silence those who claim that 9-11 was an inside job, that the WTC was brought down by explosives inside the buildings. It has been proven again that flaming fuel oil, such as what was in the airline fuel tanks, can melt structural steel, even when the metal is inside concrete.

Delusional paranoids will rant just to hear themselves speak. I don't think any amount of intelligent, reasoned conversation will ever talk those people in from the ledge.

Anyway, what is the over and under on how many months it will take to rebuild this stretch of highway? How about the cost? Any estmites on what the good taxpayers of Californ-I-AY are going to shell out on this repair?

Chances are that the company that hired the driver will pay a small fine relative to the damage, and the driver will serve little to no time in jail for speeding and causing this damage. A suitable punishment might be to give everyone inconvenienced by this guy the chance at one swift kick to his ass.