Surely You Can't Be Serious: The Sellwood Bridge

Sorry, for the blur spot. It was bright and I couldn't see
the panorama correctly in my camera.

Today was my first day on the project site. I won't go into too much detail, but you can learn more about the project here. There's even a link to two live feed cameras. Currently, we have to help Advanced American Construction set 150 pylons by Oct. 15. Basically, I stand on the shore (currently) and tell them based on our instrument readings where they need to go to set the pylon in the correct spot. It sounds like "Go offshore/inshore 3 tenths and upriver/downriver 8 tenths." We aim for a 2 tenth tolerance, but it's up to them to decide when it's close enough. This process takes patience since our instruments are very accurate and a crane on a barge is not so much. Then they use a hydraulic hammer to pound it into the bedrock while we periodically stop and check to make sure we're still in the correct spot and haven't slid out of place.

Ben took this of me on the east platform.

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I was working on the east side of the bridge and just to the south. Those pylons are supposed to be temporary pylons which will become the base of the construction platform for the crews working on the new bridge. On the north side are pylons that will support the current bridge structure once they slide it off its current base in January. I was really excited to watch this, but it will take a week for the slide to fully happen because unsurprisingly it's INCHES at a time.The website I linked to above will likely have a time lapse of the process.

Our job is best described as my co-worker Ben put it
"A lot of stand by time. Followed by a flurry of action."

One interesting thing I did learn is that the bridge support is in such disrepair that fire trucks cannot cross it. So if you live on one side of the bridge you call one dispatcher and if you live on the other you call a different one. That's a bit scary, but not as scary as some of the other bridges in this country that are still actively used every day. Just check out this article to see what I mean. I think Discovery channel or something like that even did a show on them. Some of them literally crumble off when you touch them.

This is a heavier duty pylon driver. You need ear plugs.

UPDATE: Sept 28th
So, today I worked on the East side (like yesterday), the West side for one pylon, and then we set up a control point in the middle of the river. It's on two steel beams welded to the one of the current base structures and the tiny catwalk space is also welded to it about 30 feet up from the water level. this is where I spent about a third of my day. Below are a few helpful pictures and a few "I'm bored and trying to be artsy pictures". Enjoy! Oh, and my boss asked me if I'd be interested in going to Fairbanks the 8th - 14th of this month, so in a little more than a week, I'll be back in Alaska for a week! I'm so excited, but at this point I don't know if I'll be able to work out seeing any friends in Anchorage, so don't get too excited. Also, as I've experienced numerous times in this career- plans may change I might not go at all. But until then I'll be at the bridge! (The following photos are not in order. Deal with it!)

This won't mean much to anyone but a surveyor, but
this is how we're attached to the existing bridge structure.
So, even when no one is driving pylons- it still vibrates.
We have a plan to reset and improve this.

The view from my perch down to the the transport boat.

Panorama from the west side of the bridge.
The white bags are full of tiny gravel. I punched one for a few minutes
to see how it compared to a kickboxing bag. I like it, but it had a hole and
kept spitting tiny rocks at me.

The TS6. How I do all my magic.
SHHHH!!!! DON'T TELL ANYONE!!!

The view from my mid-river perch looking toward
the one of many barges that has the pylon I'm putting in.
(It's at the far back, of course)
PS. if you're a surveyor- what do you think of my instrument setup?