Headline News
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Caltrans decided to install high-risk steel rods on the Bay Bridge's new eastern span after a supplier pointed out that the agency had already approved them for the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, according to documents the agency released Tuesday.
SF Chronicle -
Virgin America landed at the top of the latestConsumer Reports ratings of airlines in its first appearance on the list, receiving some of the highest customer satisfaction scores any airline has in years...Spirit Airlines found itself at the bottom of the ratings, with the lowest marks across the board.
USA Today -
The Paris of grand monuments, stately boulevards and haute cuisine is justly famous. But the city is also the hub of the world’s fifth-largest economy, with more than two million people grappling with 21st-century problems of global competitiveness,immigration and assimilation, and a chronic shortage of affordable housing...The project will offer commuters and residents a range of transportation options, including two new Metro stations, an extension of the tramway that nearly circles the city, a regional rail station and a 600-space underground parking garage.
New York Times -
...The University of California at Merced, California State University, Fresno, and CSU, Bakersfield, have already begun exploring opportunities for high-speed rail focused educational programs. We could be on the cusp of becoming the nation's high-speed rail technology hub.
Merced Sun Star -
Sprawl is expensive. It costs more money to pave a road and connect a sewer line to five families each living a block apart on wooded lots than to build public infrastructure for those same five families living in a condo. It costs more money (and takes more time and gas) to serve those families with garbage trucks, fire engines, and ambulances. And in return – as we've previously written – those five sprawling single-family homes likely yield less in tax revenue per acre than the apartment building that could house our fictitious residents downtown.
Atlantic Cities -
Early-life exposure to traffic-related air pollution was significantly associated with higher hyperactivity scores at age 7, according to new research from the University of Cincinnati (UC) and Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center..."Several biological mechanisms could explain the association between hyperactive behaviors and traffic-related air pollution," including narrowed blood vessels in the body and toxicity in the brain's frontal cortex, according to Nicholas Newman, DO, director of the Pediatric Environmental Health and Lead Clinic at the medical center.
ScienceDaily -
The 787 Dreamliner flight from Houston to Chicago was the first time the landmark Boeing jet was back in U.S. skies after the plane was grounded worldwide in January because of problems with its battery system. United, the only U.S. carrier currently flying the 787, is scheduling Dreamliner flights from Houston to other U.S. cities this week, and on June 10, it will put the plane into service between Denver and Tokyo.
USA Today -
Caltrans needs to examine hundreds of at-risk rods on the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge and replace any that are hard enough to be vulnerable to cracking, says an internationally known expert who serves as an adviser to the state agency...Caltrans documents suggest that the state agency received hundreds of such rods for the eastern span. Thirty-two designed to hold seismic-stability structures in place have already broken...Brian Maroney, Caltrans' chief engineer on the bridge project, said..."We haven't decided to do that yet - that is one alternative, one consideration," Maroney said. "We might do that."
SF Chronicle -
...For months, the governor had dismissed revelations about shoddy construction and inspection practices on the grandiose, long overdue and massively over-budget project to replace the eastern portion of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.
Mercury Newsews -
The Orange Line is feeling the squeeze. An immediate success upon its opening in 2005, ridership continues to surge on the San Fernando Valley’s dedicated busway, which runs from Woodland Hills and Chatsworth to North Hollywood. The line currently handles more than 30,000 passengers on an average weekday, making it the second busiest bus line in Los Angeles County. While that success is something to celebrate, elbow room is getting hard to come by.
Zev's Blog