Follow the money, John Daley suggests: Specifically, the money flowing from Big Dig contractors to our best and brightest on Beacon Hill, including newly outraged Tom Reilly.
Tim Lavallee listens to an audio book about Bechtel's practices in Third World countries (you remember Bechtel, as in Bechtel Parsons Brinherhoff, the joint venture that oversaw the Big Dig?) and learns some lessons:
Amy reports that even before Monday's ceiling collapse, her grandmother refused to visit her cousin who lives in Revere because it would have meant driving through the tunnels:
The Hispanic Community Church of Boston and Citizens Bank have set up a fund for the family of the woman who died in that Big Dig ceiling collapse. Donations can be made at any Citizens branch to the Memorial Account for Yetty M Del Valle.
Via Joe Dwinell.
This week's Big Dig accident is not the first time the roof of a highway tunnel has collapsed in Massachusetts. The same thing happened in Fall River seven years ago. Read more here:
Lawsuits filed in Fall River tunnel accident
Mr. Cunha said Joao Medeiros was in his car with his wife, Beatrice, and their two children, Sarah and Amanda, when the concrete slabs fell from the roof.
Tim Lavallee took a deep breath then drove home via the Big Dig last night:
left work tonight expecting the longest commute home ever. Instead, the Big Dig was empty like a Sunday morning. Traffic on the southbound side was very, very light. Even the usual slow down areas, such as the tunnel exit to the South Bay mall, was a speed limit breeze. ...
Out there on the Other Coast, SFWillie manages to find a connection between the Big Dig tragedy and Barry Bonds's home-run record: Both involve cheating.
Ben Ostrander drove through a Big Dig tunnel today:
Friday18 and her husband used to work for a materials testing company - hired to test construction material on certain very large public-works projects in the Boston, many involving the same company responsible for the part of the Big Dig tunnel with the collapsing concrete slabs. And she explains why this makes her completely unsurprised by the collapse.
The tragic story of the car being crushed last night in one of the Big Dig tunnels got me thinking...
I am not sure that I believe in a God, certainly not one that most organized religions feel the need to pray to, and worse, fear. But, I know that I believe in something, some force (no Star Wars jokes, please...)out there stronger than you and I that is playing a part in our lives, maybe keeping a balance between good and bad, right and wrong. Maybe something like Karma...
Now, I am not in any way saying that the poor woman who was killed by that giant block of falling cement had it coming or had lived her life in a way that would have some bad karma due to her. But, it does make me think that life can't be totally random. She was in the passenger seat of that car and the driver was able to walk away from this incident with nothing but scratches. Physically unscathed that is...I'm sure he is going to have some emotional trauma to deal with for a long time to come from such a horrifying ordeal.
Breaking news: Mitt Romney to try to oust Matt Amorello; says nobody can feel safe in the tunnel system right now: "I don't have any confidence in this individual."
Jennifer reports it took her three hours to get to the airport this morning and then to work.
EnuhCorK took an alternate route:
Saying the ceiling collapse happened in "the oldest" part of a ten-year-old tunnel doesn't fill us with much confidence, Mr. Amorello, so please stop saying that.
Your comments after the photo of the turnpike/Ted Williams Tunnel connector (collapsed ceiling-tile tunnel on the left) - photo via MassGIS OLIVER:
Jen Langley doesn't get why Tom Menino is so opposed to the idea of an Armenian genocide memorial atop the Big Dig:
... There's the Holocaust Memorial and several Irish Potato Famine memorials. There's a Hungarian Revolution Monument. There's an African American History Museum and statues of Leif Eriksson.
Menino helped put a memorial to Sacco and Venzetti in the Boston Public Library!
John Daley disgustedly marvels that mayor has no say whatsoever over major development projects in the heart of the city, because the turnpike authority has final say over what's built atop the Big Dig. He notes this Globe article on the controversy over the proposed Armenian Genocide memorial, in which Big Dig Director of Urban Architecture Fred Yalouris is quoted.
OK, so six executives at the Big Dig's largest concrete supplier were arrested for passing off old, cruddy concrete as fresh stuff. Not to worry, U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan assures us - there's no evidence the tunnels are about to collapse.
Channel 4 reports that the FBI has arrested six executives at Aggregate Industries, for allegedly using inferior concrete in the Big Dig.
Bruce predicts part of the story will eventually involve Aggregate, the project's largest concrete supplier, using cheapo cement from Central and South America and wonders about the effect on Tom Reilly, who thought Big Dig legal issues were behind him.
On Boston Crazy Driving, Tim discovers he's not the only one to loop around Logan waiting for an incoming flight rather than parking, wonders why the lady in the minivan is going 25 in the HOV lane in the tunnel and concludes that the Big Dig has improved traffic:
... Everyone was supremely impressed, not in me, but in the fact that it seems like maybe the Big Dig might have been worth it after all. Or, as my sister-in-law wryly pointed out, our traffic is getting better because everyone is leaving.
On Boston Crazy Driving, Tim complains about radio and cell-phone dead spots in the new tunnel:
... What I can't understand is that if the Big Dig contractors could figure out how to freeze the soil underneath the train tracks leaving South Station so they could excavate tunnels underneath, why can't they hire someone with some technical knowledge of radio transmission to fix the tunnel. ...
On Freak Off His Leash, Chauncey describes getting lost thanks to some unannounced late-night exit closings on the Big Dig:
... I bet there are small colonies of people living in the maintenance tunnels after getting lost in the tunnels. Living on rats and the lunches they steal from the workers. Wandering around for the rest of their days searching for a way out. ...
Carpundit says it's about time the tunnel got named for Tip O'Neill:
Governor Empty Suit lost his battle to name the big new underground road here Liberty Tunnel. (That was so uncreative, so insipid an idea that it could only have come from him.) Instead it will be named, properly, the Thomas P. "Tip" O'Neill, Jr. Tunnel and called the Tip, I'm sure. Love him or hate him, Tip O'Neill drove the Big Dig, and deserves the honor. ...
Jay strolls around the North End and is already out of love with the post-Big Dig landscaping around Salem Street:
... I think it's going to be a bummer for all of us who had high hopes for something much, much better, i.e., Did they learn ANYTHING from the City Hall Plaza all-brick/concrete debacle? It looks like an urban landscape that might appear in Phoenix or somewhere else -- a minimalist urban park system that you'd expect from someone trying to skimp on landscaping costs. ...
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