The Columbian from Vancouver, Washington • 7

SUNDAY DECEMBER 15 2002 AS THE COLUMBIAN I2051SPANNIN C20jYI2R I Population and -j- County populafion bridge tramc wosawngetWy traffic 363400 (setbnatad) kt 1-205 Twenty years later no events are scheduled to mark the first two decades of bridge operation uninterrupted save fin's May 1983 day event that may have attracted as many as ON THE WKB Formofs Information visit protector crowd precast prestressed post-tensioned can-tilevered segmental construction Thousands of other fans were merely thrilled to save 20 minutes on their daily commute Others saw die bridge as a means of mainlining the profits of development guaranteeing that onceremote building sites on the eastern edge of Washougal would one day be marketed with ads that gushed 20 minutes from 1-205: From page A1 Today marks the 20th anniversary of the opening of the 1-205 Bridge a structure hailed in its day by a mqjor engineering trade publication as first of a new generation That was for the attributes admired by the plastic-pocket- WMWMWWM SOURCE: Oragon Dapartn el ItmporWion W91 WWWWOBWOOMI IB omul dt IhoColumbiin 125000 visitors There will be a parade: The nonstop around-the-clock 247365 movement of care trucks and buses over the eight lanes and 11750 feet of gracefully curved roadway Since the first hours of public use were inaugurated with a symbolic ribbontying by the two governors in die eary afternoon of Dec 15 1982 some 680 miDion vehicle trips have been made across die bridge Traffic counts have long since eclipsed those on the 1-5 Bridge its capacity crimped by a six-lane configuration To say die 1-205 Bridge has exceeded expectations is to seriously understate its ability to draw a crowd In 1982 experts hugely undershot the future traffic demand on die 1-205 Bridge by predicting that 63000 vehicles would cross each weekday in 2000 Actual usage rocketed past that estimate topping 65000 in 1987 By 2000 meters were racking up daily counts almost exactly double the 19808 prediction The 1-205 Bridge has been a rousing success Experts were much closer with their expectations for the aging twin spans of the 1-5 Bridge hi 1982 die best guess called for daily usage of 118000 vehicles in 2000 The actual number 122000 Project imequaled As a public works project the 1-205 Bridge is unequaled in this area for its physical immensity and longterm impact on the economy local traffic and lanchise patterns Envisioned in die 1950s approved by the Oregon Highway Commission in 1965 and officially started in summer 1977 die 1-205 Bridge was die final link in the bypass that leaves Interstate 5 juk north of the Salmon Creek area and rejoins the freeway in Tualatin Ore The status as a vital piece of the interstate system meant that almost all of its $175 million cost was covered by federal money BIG HOLIDAY Piano Sale! 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Prices valid only In the continental USTSee store for The elephants with their ability to move the roadway 2 or 3 inches didn't always do the trick As the cantilevered segments were built out they tended to be too high even after they were connected said Harwood That would have made tiie trip across the bridge a gentle series of humps with tiie low spots at the tops of tiie piers But there was a fix As the roadway was paved with its final layer of concrete it was applied as much as 3 inches thicker near the piers With enough frosting the most uneven cake looks perfectly flat Three worters died The triumph of the bridge project was not without tragedy: Three workers died during tiie construction A 32year-old Washougal man was killed when he fell about 70 feet from scaffolding while working above the Washington shore in March 1979 In December 1980 a crane nearly 200 feet tall toppled into the Columbia River near the Washington shore -killing a 32year-old carpenter and the 21-year-old operator The collapse occurred in winds that may have reached 60 mph and a flawed steel beam supporting tiie crane was found to have contributed to tiie accident An unsecured safety strap one of six supporting tiie scaffolding assembly as it was being removed was blamed in the Washougal death The accident with the greatest loss of life came seven years later in March 1986 when five people died in a collision that sent their car over the railing and to the bottom of the Columbia River A 23-year Vancouver man was sentenced that July on manslaughter and drunken-driving charges Those deaths a few other fatalities and the occasional suicide aside tiie day-today world on tiie 1-205 Bridge is strictly humdrum: the ming and drumming of rushing traffic Maintenance costs for tiie bridge are evenly split between Washington and Oregon Larry Olson an Oregon Department of Transportation maintenance supervisor said expenses have been largely routine sweeping debris replacing light bulbs fixing aluminum railing mangled in car wrecks Problems with expansion joints the roadway fixtures that allow those acres of concrete to grow and shrink unharmed with the temperature necessitated some repairs a couple of years ago Every two years the bridge gets a checkup an inspection that can take 40 hours For Dennis Carlson an Oregon bridge inspector one of the last assignments in a 37-year career that concludes this month will be to write up the results of his November inspection The only significant test of the bridge thus far has been the February 2001 Nisqually earthquake which concentrated its damage in the Puget Sound area moved but that faze it" said Carlson "The bridge is pretty strong" TY Lin is an 80-year-old San Francisco engineer whose firm designed the 1-205 superstructure The company that still bears his name has designed skyscrapers and other monumental projects all over the world He predicts a long and prosperous life for the ribbon of concrete and its pairs of piers saying should last 100 yearn THOMAS RYU covtred the In the eaiy 1970s the cost of the project was pegged at $60 minion An 18-month environmental impact statement process and court suits including a challenge by tiny Maywood Park an area near Rocky Butte that was incorporated in an unsuccessful challenge to the route slowed tiie planned project at a time of ranid inflation But by the late 1970s all that dust had settled and the big bridge project was approved On tiie day ground was broken completion was expected in eary 1982 Hidden challenge While if a difficult to hide a two-mile bridge one of the most spectacular aspects of the project was largely hidden from public view if only because it occurred 55 feet below the river's surface There workers labored in cofferdams of sheet-steel piling to build the two sets of piers that support the main river channel section near tiie Washington shore The pilings were driven into the river bottom and reinforced the water was pumped out and work begun to form the giant concrete blocks atop which the piers sit For the public the most visually stunning aspect of tiie construction came as die roadway sections were built out a piece at a time over the river turning tiie massive piers into immense T-shaped forms with arms in some cases as long as 300 feet Those sections were extended from the piers a segment at a time never more than one piece out of balance by two means: lifting the trapezoidal sections from barges or casting them in place Some 540 segments no two of them identical were manufactured at what is now the Columbia Business Park in Vancouver and barged to the bridge for tiie ride to the top Where tiie pier tops were too far above the water to safely lift tiie segments such as tiie main channel section with its 144 feet of vertical clearance at low water they were cast in place with a device called a form traveler After the concrete was cured the travelers would shift out to the next section as work proceeded As each section was added an important step took place: the tightening or post-tensioning of bundles of steel cables running lengthwise through tubes in each new piece of superstructure Like muscle tendons the cables are what give tiie bridge much of its strength Cafing in the As the superstructure readied out to meet its counterpart extending from the adjacent pier work Btopped when the unspanned gap was narrowed to 8 feet With hundreds of thousands of pounds of concrete and steel seemingly floating in the air above the river some adjustment was bound to be necessary Thaf where the blocks of concrete weighing as much as 15 tons each were called la Like shifting a teeterfotter the blocks were piled at one end of a Ts arm For every 100000 pounds or so the opposite end rose an Inch or two If one piece was high ft could be lowered by directly piling the blocks on it The "elephant" term came not from engineering textbooks but from the newspaper funny pages "Somebody saw a cartoon where they were trying to 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