The bridge in Florida that collapsed, killing multiple people, was being built using a method that engineers and contractors use all over the country, including here in the Bay Area.
A recently-completed bridge in Vallejo is a good example. It’s a very different type of structure but built with a similar method.
The ABC method stands for Accelerated Bridge Construction, and it basically means pieces of a bridge are built mostly off-site before the structure goes up.
KRON4 looked at the fairly new Laurel Street overcrossing bridge in Vallejo as an example.
As you drive on Interstate 780 in Vallejo, you’ll pass under the Laurel Street overcrossing bridge.
Up top. it has two-way traffic and sidewalks on either side.
“I do take this bridge a lot, and as you can see, my kids do come back and forth over this bridge,” resident Eddie Watts said.
Watts lives just up the street from the bridge and remembers all the work Caltrans did on it in June of last year.
They demolished the old bridge and put in a new, seismically sound one.
They were out here pretty much every day throughout the five months they got it done, so it seems like to me they took a little time with it,” Watts said.
Caltrans says it does use accelerated bridge construction methods, or ABC, similar to the one being used for this bridge at Florida International University when it collapsed and killed several people.
But the structures themselves are very different.
Basically, the ABC methods reduce the impact of construction projects on traffic because large pieces are built off-site and then assembled quickly at the end.
ABC methods are not new.
An engineer at UC Berkeley tells KRON4 there is nothing wrong with the process.
Hearing things like that makes Watts and his family more comfortable.
“They did a pretty good job on it,” Watts said. “I guess from what I can tell.”
Caltrans says the off-site building methods are an important and innovative tool in their transportation project toolbox.
Caltrans also adds that it goes through a rigorous, multi-step process to assure the use of ABC is appropriate for a given project.