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[MNHighwayMan]

Maybe they should just close the road under the bridge permanently, and funnel the traffic elsewhere.

What, and ruin the fun I'm having watching overheight vehicles get wrecked? Get outta here.

[freebrickproductions]

Maybe they should just close the road under the bridge permanently, and funnel the traffic elsewhere.

What, and ruin the fun I'm having watching overheight vehicles get wrecked? Get outta here.

I agree that watching karma in action is fun, but from a safety standpoint, if a rather low bridge with a history of trucks hitting it can't be raised or the road under it lowered, then the road underneath should probably be closed.

Or, alternatively, they could have one of these gates set-up to lower automatically as soon as it detects a truck that's too tall... Company that made them claimed the gates could stop a truck moving at 40 MPH, and I can't imagine traffic going much faster than that on this road...

[1995hoo]

I read somewhere that the state DOT, which is responsible for the road, decided that since there have been no deaths and fewer than five injuries, they would concentrate on more important priorities (including an 11'4" overpass elsewhere in Durham under which trucks get stuck, though without the same violence associated with the Gregson Street overpass).

[Brian556]

The bridge was in action again this morning. This truck was absolutely mangled.

Based on the video, the system is not working right. The truck entered the intersection on a yellow light. Based on what I've read on here, the light is supposed to turn red before the overheight truck reaches it.

[kkt]

The bridge was in action again this morning. This truck was absolutely mangled.

Based on the video, the system is not working right. The truck entered the intersection on a yellow light. Based on what I've read on here, the light is supposed to turn red before the overheight truck reaches it.

Yes, it looked that way to me too.  The trucks are probably coming too fast to measure their height.  Perhaps the light at the nearest intersection should generally be red and permit one vehicle at a time to pass after its height has been measured.

[1995hoo]

I wonder if there ought to be another height-triggered light at the intersection before that one (Main Street) in order to reduce the frequency of trucks speeding through the light at Peabody and slamming into the bridge. It wouldn't necessarily be as simple as I just made it sound because Main is a much busier street than Peabody is, making it more difficult to have a light changing at seemingly random times, but if you had two consecutive height-triggered lights, you'd probably reduce the severity of truck crashes even if they weren't eliminated completely because I assume it would be less likely for a truck to blast through consecutive red lights. (A comparison point familiar to me is the 10'0" railroad bridge on the Corner near UVA in Charlottesville—while occasionally trucks get stuck under it despite warnings that include a loud bell, the crashes are far less violent because University Avenue is a much slower-speed roadway than Gregson Street due to the nature of the area.)

BTW, as I was typing this I pulled up both Apple Maps and Google Maps to refresh my recollection on the street pattern around there, and I notice both of them list "11foot8 Bridge" as a landmark.

[D-Dey65]

And that one looks like they were pro drivers, not amateurs driving a rental van.
Hope nobody lost irreplaceable items in the truck.

I'm still convinced some of these people do it on purpose so they can get on YouTube.  The keyword in that sentence being "some."

  < "Hey look, Ma! I'm on a viral video for crashing my 13'6" truck into that 11'8" bridge, and I lived to brag about it and make an ass of myself." 

 

[Sykotyk]

And that one looks like they were pro drivers, not amateurs driving a rental van.
Hope nobody lost irreplaceable items in the truck.

I'm still convinced some of these people do it on purpose so they can get on YouTube.  The keyword in that sentence being "some."

  < "Hey look, Ma! I'm on a viral video for crashing my 13'6" truck into that 11'8" bridge, and I lived to brag about it and make an ass of myself." 

 

If you've ever rented a rental truck, they stipulate, quite clearly, that there is no insurance coverage for topping the vehicle on trees, power lines, bridges, drive thrus, etc.

And your personal auto insurance generally won't cover it, either. So, you'd be on the hook for the few thousand dollars minimum to put a new box on it for those trucks.


The problem is they're using regular red/green lights to activate and then the lit sign advising to turn. I think what NEEDS to be done is that several trip sensors across the road for any vehicle at 11' or more triggers bright flashing red lights (think major train crossings) and bright reverse lit message board advising OVERHEIGHT TRUCK -- STOP where the words are negative space and everything else is lit up

And aside from all that, the biggest needs to be an educational campaign among anyone who operates in the area (they have 125 company names just from this) to advise people they can't take overheight trucks on this road because they won't fit. Anyone renting a moving truck should be told explicitly not to even take the vehicle on this road.