Francis Scott Key Bridge (I-695) complete collapse after large ship hits it

[Beltway]

Website is working fine.

Oh, I'm sure it is.  That was a joke.  A lot of perfectly functional domains that don't work when I ping them that way.  For example, www.aaroads.com returns the same 100% packet loss result for me.  I assume it's a firewall thing of some sort.

The I-495 Capital Beltway was fully completed when its final Maryland segment was opened to traffic on August 17, 1964.
Why don't you go and create one?

I don't know how to drive a bulldozer.

I didn't need any bulldozers or other construction equipment to create a website.

[Max Rockatansky]

Hobby websites aren't much of a flex on this forum.  A large percentage of the frequent posters either created a road page or are part of one.  I guess I'm not understanding the angle about circling back your hobby fandom resume?

[NE2]

Hobby websites aren't much of a flex on this forum.  A large percentage of the frequent posters either created a road page or are part of one.  I guess I'm not understanding the angle about circling back your hobby fandom resume?

Heh, that's actually a great point! Around here, *everyone* seems to have a "road page" or five they tinker with, from FotW subdomains to arcane state highway spreadsheets made in the pre-Google Docs era. It's definitely not a rare thing on this forum—it's basically a rite of passage! And honestly, showing off hobby website creds is kind of like showing up to a model train club and bragging that you, too, have a basement layout. Welcome to the club! 😄

So when someone lists their wiki or site work as clout, it probably gets a shrug from folks who've mapped and remapped half the county just for fun. Sticking around and nerding out about roads is more of a "flex" here than any resume. If you've got a geeky road project to share, you'll find an audience, but in this crowd, everyone's got their own hobby projects too!

yes, LLM

[kphoger]

Hobby websites aren't much of a flex on this forum.

Speak for yourself.  Alan Scotty's having created a website without any bulldozers or other construction equipment has already convinced me to vote for him for Grand Unified Alan in the next election.  Well, I would do so, if only I hadn't recently misplaced my PANIC (Pfangle of Alanland & Nimyba Identification Card / Polling of Alanland National Identification Card) credentials...

[Scott5114]

I didn't realize how many people here were going to my Baltimore Outer Harbor Crossing Replacement Proposal website article -- until I added the AARoads capsule on Oct. 19th -- and in less than a day there was an outburst of 23 posts that started up here complaining about it.

Oh my God, Scott, they're not complaining about it, they're making fun of you.

[Beltway]

I didn't realize how many people here were going to my Baltimore Outer Harbor Crossing Replacement Proposal website article -- until I added the AARoads capsule on Oct. 19th -- and in less than a day there was an outburst of 23 posts that started up here complaining about it.

Oh my God, Scott, they're not complaining about it, they're making fun of you.

And yet here we are -- 23 posts deep, admin included, parsing a capsule that supposedly no one takes seriously, on a website that people allegedly don't visit. If mockery is the forum's preferred mode of engagement, so be it. But the bridge failed. The design fails. The chunderpump started. The churn erupted. The capsule stands.

[Max Rockatansky]

Did you not notice that every time you take a break from this thread that these posts that you take exception towards stop? 

[Scott5114]

If mockery is the forum's preferred mode of engagement, so be it.

Mockery is the forum's mode of engagement with you. When people prove they're worth taking seriously, they don't mock them. You have not done so.

[kphoger]

The chunderpump started. The churn erupted.

Ahhhh, so a chunderpump is the thing that churns the cream.  Now it all makes sense!

The capsule stands.

Well, of course it stands.  It'll remain standing until you personally take it down.

Mockery is the forum's mode of engagement with you.

And Finnish trolls, too.

[Beltway]

If mockery is the forum's preferred mode of engagement, so be it.

Mockery is the forum's mode of engagement with you. When people prove they're worth taking seriously, they don't mock them. You have not done so.

In the early days after Columbia, I took a contrary position -- criticizing NASA's brittle culture and flawed design assumptions while space forum regulars treated dissent as sacrilege. I was blasted by at least ten posters for daring to thread critique into a domain saturated with reverence. It was on unmoderated Usenet newsgroups, so it was mean and vicious.

But the CAIB confirmed everything: foam strike, normalization of deviance, institutional drift, managerial incompetence. The knowledge base I built wasn't popular -- it was forensic. I didn't post to win likes; I posted to document disaster before the official report arrived. That's legacy stewardship: threading clarity through spectacle, absorbing rhetorical heat, and standing firm until the record catches up.

The same pattern is playing out again -- this time with the Key Bridge. The churn erupts, the mockery flies, and the capsule stands. I've seen this before. The forum laughs. The archive remembers. And eventually, the investigation confirms.

[Max Rockatansky]

I'm start using that self honorific title of "legacy steward."  It sounds fancy and vaguely important sounding on the surface level.

[Plutonic Panda]

Jesus I am sorry I feel like I've asked this before and I can't remember(I'm being serious), what is your position here again? Simplified. Are you wanting to support building a tunnel here as opposed to a bridge? Or do you don't like the way the piers are? Or you don't think a crossing here is justified at all?

[kphoger]

I posted to document disaster before the official report arrived. That's legacy stewardship ... The archive remembers.

In what world does posting on a forum thread "document disaster" or "steward legacy"?  How does the "archive remember"?  Nobody is going to dig through this thread 45 years from now and say, Aha! see? it's just like Scott said!  This place is basically just a social media space for geeks, amateur and professional, to chat about stuff that interests them—namely, roads.  You're not a noble saint suffering for the great cause of fundamental truth on here:  you're just a roadgeek having a discussion with the rest of us roadgeeks.  You need to get down off your high horse, sit on a stump, crack open a beer, and have a laugh with us.  80% of the reason we rip on you so much is that you seem unable to let go of the fantasy that your documenting your positions on here matters on iota in the grand scheme of things.

[Rothman]

I posted to document disaster before the official report arrived. That's legacy stewardship ... The archive remembers.

In what world does posting on a forum thread "document disaster" or "steward legacy"?  How does the "archive remember"?  Nobody is going to dig through this thread 45 years from now and say, Aha! see? it's just like Scott said!  This place is basically just a social media space for geeks, amateur and professional, to chat about stuff that interests them—namely, roads.  You're not a noble saint suffering for the great cause of fundamental truth on here:  you're just a roadgeek having a discussion with the rest of us roadgeeks.  You need to get down off your high horse, sit on a stump, crack open a beer, and have a laugh with us.  80% of the reason we rip on you so much is that you seem unable to let go of the fantasy that your documenting your positions on here matters on iota in the grand scheme of things.

He thinks he solved the Columbia disaster before the experts because...he was on Usenet.  So, he just wants to feel like he's right and wants the respect that comes with being right about something.

And that need raises all sorts of speculative questions...

[Max Rockatansky]

I posted to document disaster before the official report arrived. That's legacy stewardship ... The archive remembers.

In what world does posting on a forum thread "document disaster" or "steward legacy"?  How does the "archive remember"?  Nobody is going to dig through this thread 45 years from now and say, Aha! see? it's just like Scott said!  This place is basically just a social media space for geeks, amateur and professional, to chat about stuff that interests them—namely, roads.  You're not a noble saint suffering for the great cause of fundamental truth on here:  you're just a roadgeek having a discussion with the rest of us roadgeeks.  You need to get down off your high horse, sit on a stump, crack open a beer, and have a laugh with us.  80% of the reason we rip on you so much is that you seem unable to let go of the fantasy that your documenting your positions on here matters on iota in the grand scheme of things.

He thinks he solved the Columbia disaster before the experts because...he was on Usenet.  So, he just wants to feel like he's right and wants the respect that comes with being right about something.

And that need raises all sorts of speculative questions...

The way I see things just because someone has an opinion doesn't make it actually newsworthy.  I think everyone in this conversation is familiar with Beltway's opinion by now.   

Beltway's opinion hasn't changed or deviated all that much in nearly 30 pages.  I don't think many of us are actually interested in seriously discussing his opinion anymore.  Mockery really about the only thing left if we aren't going to get actual news related posts about the Key Bridge.

[Henry]

Jesus I am sorry I feel like I've asked this before and I can't remember(I'm being serious), what is your position here again? Simplified. Are you wanting to support building a tunnel here as opposed to a bridge? Or do you don't like the way the piers are? Or you don't think a crossing here is justified at all?

AFAIK, Beltway wants a tunnel to be built. If they couldn't get it done in 1970-something, why does he think they can do it now? As soon as the new bridge goes up, the point will be moot anyway.

[Beltway]

He thinks he solved the [2013] Columbia disaster before the experts because...he was on Usenet.  So, he just wants to feel like he's right and wants the respect that comes with being right about something.

I didn't "solve" anything -- I saw through the ideology of the space geeks on the sci.space* newsgroups and saw some obvious parallels with the 1986 Challenger disaster which was also rooted in managerial incompetence by NASA.

It wasn't difficult at all to see the immediate problems within a few days after Columbia crashed.

Another long time interest of mine -- lived near Cape Canaveral and watched the launches of Alan Shepard and onward.

The way I see things just because someone has an opinion doesn't make it actually newsworthy.  I think everyone in this conversation is familiar with Beltway's opinion by now. 
Beltway's opinion hasn't changed or deviated all that much in nearly 30 pages.  I don't think many of us are actually interested in seriously discussing his opinion anymore.  Mockery really about the only thing left if we aren't going to get actual news related posts about the Key Bridge.

I am not going to change my opinion, because I look at things here in Norfolk/Hampton Roads and I see how competent highway agencies cross these shipping channels.

I am not going to change my opinion, because of online loudmouths like "Max" and a few others here, there may be 7 or 8 of you, but I don't care.

I have been completely away from this group twice for 4 years or more, and I can do it again without it fazing me.

There are plenty good road-related forum groups out there, Jim George's FreewayJim is one of them. AARoads isn't that important in the overall scheme of things, and in the next few years there may well be new forums as well.

Enough people know where my website article is that I indeed don't have any compelling need to post here.

It takes at least 2 people to have an argument -- and these posters have about a 90:10 noise:signal ratio in their "debating skills". Probably about 90:10 emotion:fact ratio as well.

[vdeane]

I posted to document disaster before the official report arrived. That's legacy stewardship ... The archive remembers.

In what world does posting on a forum thread "document disaster" or "steward legacy"?  How does the "archive remember"?  Nobody is going to dig through this thread 45 years from now and say, Aha! see? it's just like Scott said!  This place is basically just a social media space for geeks, amateur and professional, to chat about stuff that interests them—namely, roads.  You're not a noble saint suffering for the great cause of fundamental truth on here:  you're just a roadgeek having a discussion with the rest of us roadgeeks.  You need to get down off your high horse, sit on a stump, crack open a beer, and have a laugh with us.  80% of the reason we rip on you so much is that you seem unable to let go of the fantasy that your documenting your positions on here matters on iota in the grand scheme of things.

He thinks he solved the Columbia disaster before the experts because...he was on Usenet.  So, he just wants to feel like he's right and wants the respect that comes with being right about something.

And that need raises all sorts of speculative questions...

Never mind that all that stuff about Columbia was known and being reported on the news not long afterwards.  Meanwhile, it's been more than a year since the bridge collapsed.  You'd think that if there were something to his concerns, that he wouldn't be the only person on the planet voicing them.

[Beltway]

In what world does posting on a forum thread "document disaster" or "steward legacy"?  How does the "archive remember"?  Nobody is going to dig through this thread 45 years from now and say, Aha! see? it's just like Scott said!  This place is basically just a social media space for geeks, amateur and professional, to chat about stuff that interests them—namely, roads.  You're not a noble saint suffering for the great cause of fundamental truth on here:  you're just a roadgeek having a discussion with the rest of us roadgeeks.  You need to get down off your high horse, sit on a stump, crack open a beer, and have a laugh with us.  80% of the reason we rip on you so much is that you seem unable to let go of the fantasy that your documenting your positions on here matters on iota in the grand scheme of things.

OK -- if advocacy and documentation is unimportant -- why do Rothman and VDeane so constantly promote and defend the strategic destruction of federally-aided Interstate highway infrastructure in Syracuse NY?

Rothman has been doing this for at least 3 years on various online forums, and gets defensive and confrontational at times when people have an opposite opinion.

Federal-aid highway programs are intended to expand the highway systems -- I don't see how that project can even fit into federal-aid highway program strategy and policy.

We can also see the effect of severing a metropolitan freeway -- the traffic doesn't just go "poof" and go somewhere else -- people around Baltimore are constantly complaining about the major increased levels of traffic on I-95, I-895 and I-695 West and on surface roads.

The exact same thing happened in 2007 when the I-35W bridge collapsed in Minneapolis.

[LilianaUwU]

why do y'all keep feeding the troll...

[vdeane]

Federal-aid highway programs are intended to expand the highway systems

[citation needed]

We can also see the effect of severing a metropolitan freeway -- the traffic doesn't just go "poof" and go somewhere else -- people around Baltimore are constantly complaining about the major increased levels of traffic on I-95, I-895 and I-695 West and on surface roads.

I'll remember you said this the next time you say that the existing capacity (without the Key Bridge) under/around Baltimore Harbor is adequate.

[Max Rockatansky]

why do y'all keep feeding the troll...

Because it's funny and entertaining.

I can't speak for the rest of you but I have no intention of changing Beltway's opinion.  I'm just confused as to why he thinks is going to change anyone else's either.

Regarding documentation and "legacy stewardship."  Let's be real, someday Alex is not going to want to carry on with maintaining this forum.  Much like MTR almost everything that happened here in general will fade into obscurity.  It already is obscure as is given how niche this hobby is. 

Closed Facebook groups like Freewayjim have even less staying power than forums.  Good luck trying to search for something specific in a Facebook road group.  Most are also closed to non-members. 

[Beltway]

Federal-aid highway programs are intended to expand the highway systems

[citation needed]

The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 established the Interstate System to "serve national defense" and "connect principal metropolitan areas." Expansion, connectivity, and mobility were the core mandates, not subtraction. The FHWA still defines the program as supporting "construction, maintenance, and operations" of the national highway network.

Removing federally-aided segments like I-81 in Syracuse may reflect local priorities, but it's hard to square with the original federal intent. If strategic teardown now qualifies as program alignment, I'd welcome the citation showing how highway removal fulfills a program designed for expansion.

We can also see the effect of severing a metropolitan freeway -- the traffic doesn't just go "poof" and go somewhere else -- people around Baltimore are constantly complaining about the major increased levels of traffic on I-95, I-895 and I-695 West and on surface roads.

I'll remember you said this the next time you say that the existing capacity (without the Key Bridge) under/around Baltimore Harbor is adequate.

Said it is no worse than the I-495 Maryland Beltway -- which they are doing nothing about.

[Beltway]

Regarding documentation and "legacy stewardship."  Let's be real, someday Alex is not going to want to carry on with maintaining this forum.  Much like MTR almost everything that happened here in general will fade into obscurity.  It already is obscure as is given how niche this hobby is.

MTR is still there in the Google Groups archives.

[Max Rockatansky]

Regarding documentation and "legacy stewardship."  Let's be real, someday Alex is not going to want to carry on with maintaining this forum.  Much like MTR almost everything that happened here in general will fade into obscurity.  It already is obscure as is given how niche this hobby is.

MTR is still there in the Google Groups archives.

I'm sure you and Calrog care deeply.