The Lafayette Bridge worries some, especially now

It's long. It's old. It's crowded. It vibrates.

And it was rated lower, structurally, than the bridge that fell in Minneapolis on August 1.

Those are just some of the reasons "bridge-a-phobiacs" avoid the Lafayette Bridge in Saint Paul, when they can. In fact Ramsey County Commissioner Tony Bennett says he gets an uneasy feeling up there on the bridge deck when it starts to shake.

"It does if you're in rush hour, it shakes a bit," Bennett remarked.

The former Saint Paul police officer recalls doing traffic control on Sheperd road back in 1967 when the Lafayette Bridge was being built. Forty years later, he avoids crossing it during rush hour, on the chance he'll get stuck on it as semi rumbles past.

"I sat out there one day for about 10 minutes on that bridge, backed up in traffic, with trucks going by on the other side. It wobbles. It?s an experience I just didn?t particularly like."

While the Lafayette's not the best looking of the spans that straddle the Mississippi in Saint Paul, it's definitely the work horse of the bunch, carrying 80,000 vehicles per day traveling on U.S. Highway 52.

For those who fear bridges it takes a leap of faith. It's two-thirds of a mile long, including a stretch across a river with heavy barge traffic during the summer.

MnDOT's latest inspection was in June and the agency expresses confidence the bridge will stand strong until it's replaced. That's currently slated for the year 2011, although some drivers would like to see that happen sooner.

"I think if you don?t fix it pretty soon it?s not just the hole in the roof, it?s the whole roof," Bennett quipped as he stood just upstream from the bridge.

"I?m not sure whether this one maybe reached its maximum life."

The bridge has a "structural sufficiency" rating from the government of 49.5, which is slightly lower than the scorecard for the 35-W bridge that collapsed in Minneapolis. It was years ahead of the 35-W bridge on the list of heavily traveled bridges to be replaced.

It's one of 73,000 "structurally deficient" bridges in the nation. The federal government's evaluation of the super structure put it in a category labeled "meets minimum tolerable limits to be left in place as is."

And while it was designed and built differently than the doomed Minneapolis bridge, the Lafayette's similar when it comes to a failure risks. It's one of 217 spans in Minnesota considered "fracture critical" because the primary supports aren't redundant.

If one of the main side beams, which run the length of the bridge, would falter, the entire structure would be compromised.

As Saint Paul City Engineer John Maczko put it, "There are two main beams and then there?s cross members. So if one of the outside beams fails that could cause the bridge to collapse."

The lower sections of the Lafayette are supported by four big beams in each direction, so if one fails the others will pick up the slack. That's redundancy. But the key segment that straddles the river relies on those two beams going each way.

In 1975, just seven years after the Lafayette opened, it developed a huge crack in one of those main support beams causing it to sag. MnDOT closed the bridge at that time while the beam was repaired with metal plating.

But on the bright side, Maczko says the Lafayette is much easier to keep tabs on than the one that came tumbling down upstream in the Mill City on August 1.

"In a lot of ways this one?s easier to inspect, easier to repair, easier to get at than the truss style bridge that was in Minneapolis."

And, as for that shaking up on the deck, it's not all that unnerving to the veteran civil engineer.

"It?s not uncommon to be sitting on a bridge and feel it bouncing," Mazcko explained.

"They?re designed to do that. It?s like the bones in your body. They flex. If they didn?t they?d break."

For engineers and drivers alike the more pressing safety issue on the Lafayette is what happens on the north end of the span. It comes to an abrupt end, a junction with options that include a sudden stop at West Seventh Street.

"According to MnDOT's own records it averages 135 accidents a year on the north end because of the tight entering ramps," Maczko told us.

In fact over the years many cars have crossed the bridge only to crash into the Savoy Pizza Grill at the end of the Lafayette. So many cars have strayed into the Savoy the city had to install a concrete barrier in front of the place.

And those northbound drivers choosing to stay on U.S. 52 are forced to take a hard right to get into a tightly curving I-94 entrance ramp. And as vehicles cue up to make that exit it can create long back-ups on the bridge deck.

"It's like a dead-end," Commissioner Bennett lamented.

"With the freeways you've got nothing on either end of the bridge, but on this one you've got stoplights and it backs up to the length of that bridge and then some."

That's why politicians and planners in Saint Paul are pressing MnDOT for realignment in the next version of the Lafayette. It will no doubt drive up the cost of the project.

But, as we've heard often since the 35-W collapse, infrastructure doesn't build itself. Maczko argues our parents and grandparents created a great public works legacy that is now in jeopardy.

"And what our generation is doing is using that infrastructure and not reinvesting in it. And what we?re gonna leave our kids and grandchildren is gonna be a complete disaster."

By John Croman, KARE 11 News

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