And what's worse, is that, as I said, the bridge eventually got the HHH stadium traffic, something for which it carried traffic in and out, but had NOT been designed to hold. Further riverfront development ensured more traffic crossed than had ever been the ORIGINAL intent. We warned them about highly concentrated urban development many, many times over the years. But the price of real estate was right, the poor had to be moved and the jobs "created".
I am going to mention this, too. My family built bridges in Minnesota and so I knew something about the fact it should be done PROPERLY. You can google "mendota bridge" and see what a marvel that was ... so much mitigated against the building of this bridge. It is a city and area of BRIDGES. There was no excuse for shoddy construction and what's more .. Minnesota stopped using Minnesota engineers to plan and construct them!
This is an extreme example of development taking precedence over people, and we, the citizens - mislabled as "commies", NDNs, pot-smoking hippies, POOR people -- warned them about possible consequences ...
Yes, I wrote hard and long about this bridge and urban development misplans for years and was part of the business community shut out of the planning; we just couldn't afford the high rent newly constructed artistic centers wanted to charge. I batted heads with Heller Seagal on many occasions.
The bridge has been a tragedy since Day One.
I truly hope someone in the media investigates enough to find out how much money Heller Seagal got, how much the bridge contractors received, and digs deeply into the situation, rather than accepting some statements from some more white guys/gals in suits ..
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