October 27, 2002
Designing the Peace Bridge: collaboration or
predestination?
by Bruce Jackson
Workshop #3
The team handling the environmental impact study for the Peace Bridge expansion project held its third Collaborative Workshop Saturday morning the morning of October 26 at the Crystal Ridge Community Center in Crystal Beach. About 300 people turned up for it.The purpose of the meeting was for the Project's bridge consultants to show, to anyone who showed up, their design concepts for a bridge that would increase capacity, primarily for truck traffic, between Fort Erie and Buffalo.
The meeting had four parts. For about 90 minutes beginning at 9:00 a.m., project director Vincent "Jake" Lamb gave a PowerPoint summary of the entire process and where things are now. He always goes through the whole thing at length at the beginning of public meetings—I assume so anyone coming in for the first time won't be confused about what's going on—but this time his comments were far more defensive than usual. He several times indicated that he was responding to remarks by participants and the press about what seemed to be confusion, ambiguity and preconceived conclusions in the previous meeting, the one where they cut out of consideration all possible bridge locations other than the present site.
All the other suggested sites had failed to score 5 or higher and whoever took part in the meeting before that had agreed that no bridge proposal failing to score at least a 5 should be kept. The twin span bridge locations and designs proposed by the Buffalo and Fort Erie Public Bridge Authority didn't score 5 either, but they were grandfathered in, leaving some people to wonder if the voting structure mightn't have been defective or loaded, which I guess comes to the same thing. Lamb said that everyone had agreed on that plan so it was time to move on.
Lamb said that the usual process in these projects is to figure out the orientation first—where the bridge lands on both sides of whatever it's crossing—and then to design the bridge itself. But here, he said for a reason I couldn't quite follow, it was necessary to do both at once, which is what they're doing though it may seem that they have in fact come up with a bridge design before they've decided where the bridge will go and how it will articulate with roads and communities on either end.
After he was done, his assistant, Bruce Campbell, spent an hour or so describing and showing four slides of each of the designs, after which there was a break, then Lamb asked Buffalo Mayor Anthony Masiello to make a speech, which Tony did. Then Lamb asked the design consultants to talk about what they'd proposed and why, which they all did, except for the one who wasn't there but who sent a former student to represent him. Then Lamb opened the meeting, for what time was left, to questions and comments from the floor.
The pamphlet they handed out
Everyone attending the meeting received an agenda, a report on the voting at the previous meeting, a booklet with all of the PowerPoint screens in Lamb's talk, and a full-color booklet with drawings, water colors, and computer-generated images of all the bridge designs presently under consideration.
The two color images that stand first are the Buffalo and Fort Erie Public Bridge Authority's two companion designs. Both have the same horizontal design and the five arches starting on the Canadian side coming over to the Black Rock canal. One has a more modern steel arch that begins like the other five, but has a sixth arch coming up from the waterline over the bridge to support it from above rather than below. The other replaces the clumsy Parker truss with a duplicate modern steel arch. Both of these drawings are almost rustic: the water is calm, the roadways are computer-putty-grey, and there are a few widely-separated cars on the bridge but not a single truck in sight.
The next two pages have watercolors of the four replacement spans suggested by the engineering consultants for the Public Consensus Review panel two years ago. One mimics the George Washington Bridge, one turns the current bridge upside down, with all the under-bridge support arches turned into over-bridge cable arches; one looks like the legs of a squatting ballerina; and one looks like two huge upside-down slingshots. There's a bit more auto traffic in these watercolors than the PBA's two companion designs, but still not a truck in sight.
There is no drawing of the lovely, curving design by former UB School of Architecture dean Bruno Freschi and San Francisco bridge designed T.Y. Lin that helped initiate all the resentment toward the PBA's very ugly twin span design. I think that is because one of the Canadian engineers hired by the PBA to screw up the work of the Public Consensus Review Panel two years ago said that such a design wasn't feasible because it was more complicated than a straight bridge.
That's all historical. The bulk of the pamphlet is 25 computer generated graphics of designs produced by the project's three design consultants: Figg Engineering, Christian Menn, and a team composed of two engineering firms, Mojecki-Masters and Buckland-Taylor.
Diane Christian has already summarized these as well as anyone might in "Peace Bridge Models" (Buffalo Report 26 October 2002): "Overall, the designs are ugly. The images suggest concrete MacDonalds' arches, inverted goalposts, wishbones, tuning forks or aliens, or masses that are very bottom heavy."
The only one Christian found at all elegant was Christian Menn's companion bridge, but that, she said, is "flat and uninspiring—just artful in making the old bridge palatable. Like a wart, the Parker truss on the old bridge controls the face."
That wart seems to be the single most important factor driving all the designs. All of the designers began with that as a given. Even in their designs for replacement bridges, you sense its absence, like the place on a sheet of drawing paper where a line has been erased but, even so, you somehow know something used to be there.
Christian Menn's love of bridge history
Menn wasn't there but Paul Gauvreau, a civil engineering professor at the University of Toronto and a former student of Menn, was introduced as his spokesman for the day. Gauvreau talked about how and why Menn thought the old bridge had to be preserved for historical reasons:What's interesting about that is that Gauvreau felt no need at all to say anything about Menn's design for a substitute bridge. He spoke only of a companion bridge. Clearly, for him, the companion bridge was the desired outcome.He regards the Peace Bridge as a kind of state-of-the-art thing from the time that it was built with the graceful and very well-proportioned arches, the detail structure, and this sort of served as a basis for the concepts that has been developed.
In other words, how can we maintain the existence of the current Peace Bridge, how can we put the new modern bridge next to it, how can we make these two complement each other and be respectful of each other's dignity? In developing his alternatives he looked at various widenings, twinning the bridge with a companion bridge composed of arches or girder spans, and all of these seemed to detract from the historical and cultural significance of that existing bridge. In the sense that girders would make it hard to see the existing bridge from various points of view. If you had arches next to it along the same span lengths, it was almost as if you were saying, 'what's new, what's old?' ...
This led him to some of the cable-stay bridge alternatives....culminating in the bridge that was featured in the Buffalo News, which is basically a two-towered cable-stayed bridge, which is his favorite of all the alternatives because of the slender depth which basically allows you to see both the old and the new with a minimum of distraction in that regard. The new bridge represents the state of the art of 21st century engineering, yet it frames the existing bridge in a way that respects its original dignity. Those are just some very initial comments on the consideration that led to the design.
Menn did do a drawing of a substitute bridge, but it's just his companion bridge with the old bridge subtracted. The Buffalo News reported last week that Menn had said he'd compensate for the loss of the old bridge by giving trucks and cars the new bridge's pedestrian and bicycle lanes.
As Diane Christian wrote, standing alone, the design is spare and dull. It's a nice enough suspension bridge, it's big, but it does not, as Daniel Patrick Moynihan several times urged, fire the imagination. That's because the object firing Menn's imagination is the 1927 bridge. He's looking to the past, not the present, and certainly not the future.
What remains bizarre about that is that the 1927 bridge was not, as Menn insists it is, a state of the art design anyway. Menn must know better. The part from Fort Erie to the Black Rock Canal might have been state of the art, but that design was mutilated when, quite late in the process, the U.S. Coast Guard insisted on the 100-foot box clearance over the Black Rock Canal. That's why the bridge has its high point so close to the American side: it had to make that steep rise to achieve that boxy clearance. There wasn't space to do that with another under-bridge arch, so they had to support the last segment from above with the Parker truss.
There's nothing elegant or historically important about the Parker truss. It's an historical fact, but so was my grandfather's appendectomy. All historical facts do not deserve perpetual preservation.
Why should Christian Menn want to build a bridge that honors an 80-year-old bureaucratic impediment to decent design? I don't know because he was the only designer who didn't come to Saturday's session and his surrogate could do no more than speculate about the answer and defend his old teacher's choice.
It would have been a simple enough matter to get Menn to join the conversation by speakerphone, if not closed-circuit TV. Maybe they should have done that so someone could have asked him.
The problematic Anthony Masiello
When Tony Masiello got up to speak I thought that we were just going to hear the usual political fluff, but he turned out to say one of the most important things anybody standing at the front of the room said in the entire 4 ½ hour meeting.
Tony's in a creepy place these days. He's alienated many of his longtime supporters in the Black community with his vendetta against James Pitts and his intimate alliance with the group that wants to get rid of all the at-large members of the Common Council. He's alienated many of his longtime Democratic party friends with his endorsement of Republican George Pataki and his appearance of Joel Giambra's pocket on city-county issues. He's alienated almost anyone who's not a developer or liquor salesman with his advocacy of a downtown casino that is all-but-guaranteed to deal a major blow to Buffalo's leukemic tax base.
So one wonders whom he might be taking marching orders from on the Peace Bridge. Is he doing his own thinking or are Carl Paladino and Andrew Rudnick (or people like them) coming into his office telling him which way to turn? Can he hold firm and think about the city's needs in this major issue or is he ready to roll over for the Buffalo-Niagara Partnership and other organizations who have long pushed hard for a bridge of any design and any ecological consequences, just so long as it gets more trucks moving sooner rather than later?
When he got up to speak I remembered how, two years ago, nearly everyone in the Common Council's conference room for a meeting of the Peace Bridge Task Force began giggling when someone read a message he sent from where he was vacationing in Florida suggesting a solution to the twin span/new bridge problem: do both. Fix up the old bridge and put a signature bridge right next to it. People made jokes about Tony's preternatural ability to take both sides of any issue at once.
And now, there we were, with the expansion project obviously favoring exactly in deadly seriousness what Tony had suggested so long ago.
This is what he said Saturday morning:So, yes, there was the usual political puff and flutter, but there was also the heart of the matter: Tony Masiello was the single person at the front of the room to articulate one of the key concerns of the Buffalo community. It's not enough to design a bridge; you've got to think in terms of a system that works for us, a system that restores what's been taken away and makes sure that the Buffalo and Fort Erie Public Bridge Authority doesn't do us further harm.It wasn't but a short time ago that this entire issue was beset with significant frustration, disenchantment, and serious concern. And I think the process that has been put in place over the last year, year and a half, is beginning to produce results. Significant input, significant dialog, obviously some differences of opinion and that's good. But I think it's important for all of us that we continue to stay the course and work the process.
While today we saw some impressive bridge designs, I can say to each and every one of you that we need to continue to think not only of a beautiful and grand bridge, but as the mayor of the city of Buffalo I'm going to continue to push the envelope for a grand and significant gateway. A gateway that gives us not only a doable and dynamic statement of the bridge, but also a neighborhood, a park, a plaza that all fits into that wonderful vision we have of a gateway in and out of our city of Buffalo.
You know, often times as I drive around the city I see those nice big beautiful billboards, 'Think bridge, think bridge, think bridge.' Well, as this process is evolving I'm becoming more and more confident that soon we can change those billboards from thinking bridge to thinking gateway, and for me that's very very important. It's a wonderful opportunity for all of us. This exchange, while some people are in a hurry to get it done, I think is working out well. I think we need to stay the course, as I said.
And I really appreciate your support, your input and your differences of opinion, and I think something really great is going to happen to Buffalo and Western New York and similarly for Fort Erie and Southern Ontario. Thank you very much and have a great day.
Questions from the floor
The question and answer and comment period was supposedly for the panel to hear and respond to the audience, but Lamb himself fielded many of the question and responded to many of the comments.
Lynn Williams, the second person at the floor microphones, had two questions. She first asked what would be the implications for Front Park of the southern companion proposals. Her second question was:"I hear a lot of talk about preservation of the current bridge. And I'm wondering where the preservation of the truss comes in it, which was not part of the original design.
"I'll comment on your first question," Lamb said. "That has to do—let me make sure I heard it right: does the southern companion span mean that the Peace Bridge Plaza would basically stay where it's at with very little possibility of vacating land for park use? Is that it? Is that the question?" Williams nodded. "Not entirely," Lamb said. "We have alternatives that use a companion alignment with a north plaza locations. They become a little bit awkward depending upon how we lay out the plazas. These kinds of issues and the question that you raised are the very reason why we're doing this together, why we're talking alignment and bridge type together. Usually we do alignment first. Because where we position the bridge and what kind of bridge we have has a lot to do with the plaza. So during these coming workshops you will see more development of plaza alternatives with various configurations with north bridges, north companion bridge, south companion bridge, and replacement bridge to the north or replacement bridge to the south, though it works better to the north, based on the plaza.... We're trying to develop alternatives that give back as much land as possible, or that vacates as much land as possible. And the second question had to do with the Parker truss. I'll ask our experts to address that question."
Barney Martin of MMMT said, "All of our alternatives today have been developed with respect for the Parker truss in mind. None of the alternatives we have developed are built on the assumption that the Parker truss will come out. So we have tried to come up with alternatives that are complimentary and compatible with what's there. If by chance it was decided at some point that the Parker truss was to come out, that would remove some of the cluttered perspectives in some of the alternatives and may result in some minor adjustments. But the approach we've taken thus far is that we respect the Parker truss as being an element of the bridge that is key to the issue, and we've developed our concepts around that assumption. "
Paul Gauvreau, Christian Menn's student, said, "There is a definite historical value to that Parker truss and that has to be factored into the decision-making process."
Lamb said they had no preconceived notion whether the final choice would be for a companion or replacement bridge.
Pam Earl asked "I'd like to hear what you think. What are the pros and cons of keeping the old bridge or not keeping the old bridge."
Jake Lamb: Are you asking me or are you asking them?
Pam Earl: I'm asking you all.
Jake Lamb: I'm gonna pass. Frankly [frankly, I always get itchy when people start dropping the word "frankly" a lot. Why would anyone think it was necessary to tell you they're speaking frankly?], I'm sure I'll have an opinion later, but I don't have enough information to have my own opinions about this. Because I want to see these plazas developed, I want more dialogue with the communities, both the governments, the city and the town of Fort Erie, and of course the citizens on both sides. As we progress, I'll get to the point where I'll be able to answer that. To the extent that the experts want to get into that question I'll let them take a crack at it. Anybody? [Laughter, after which Lamb immediately starts speaking again.] I think they probably have the same issue I have, that it's too early to really stand up and say what they favor. Now Christian has. Christian looked at it for a total solution ... He looked at it and a critical decision in his development was that the existing bridge should stay. Basically, that was his favorite and he said so and said why. That was critical to the development of his alternative. But if you look at his alternative, you could see that you could build it and have it stand alone. His concept. I don't know if you want to comment about this Paul, if any of you want to comment about your favorites at this point or not. I frankly think it's a little too early.
Lamb then immediately moved to another questioner. That is, he first said he'd pass, then he spoke about the difficulty of answering; then he asked the panel to talk but he didn't give them a chance to say anything before changing the subject. It was really well done.
The question is: why was that avoidance necessary? I don't think Pam Earl's question was all that difficult to answer. She didn't ask them, "Which do you prefer: keep the old bridge or tear it down?" That might have put them at risk with their employers, the Buffalo and Fort Erie Public Bridge Authority. She simply asked what the pros and cons were and surely Jake Lamb, if not the design consultants, must be aware of many of them by now. Surely most of the people in that audience could have named several of them and they had none of Lamb's access to and experience with the relevant political, economic, engineering, environmental and other kinds of detail.
The killer flaw in the process
When another questioner asked about the continuing cost of maintaining an old bridge, Lamb said, "Life cycle costs of companion bridges, alternatives or concepts will include the existing bridge— what it costs to maintain it, what it costs to replace components of it, et cetera. Then you'll be able to make an evaluation along with others as to the practicality of that alternative. Today we don't have those numbers and we're not looking for a decision on that today."
That is pretty damned vague and deflecting, if you ask me.
So the two times that question came up, Lamb moved it off the table as quickly as he could.
I'm pretty sure I know why. Jake Lamb wasn't going to point out the one stumbling block to rational thinking in all of this: the almost religious devotion and attachment among Fort Erie's politicians to the old bridge. I don't know what is behind it, if they really believe that stuff or if there is some economic reason making the old bridge useful to them (a ton of maintenance jobs that would be unnecessary on a new bridge system, perhaps), but they have never budged an inch since this process began on this. Fort Erie Mayor Wayne Redekop has never altered his mantra about replacing the old bridge not being on the table, nor has any other Ontario politician.
Which is why I think that the problem given to these engineering consultants and community members is unsolvable because at this point there are too many unknowns. All anybody can do is speculate.
Anyone who has ever taken algebra knows that you cannot solve for more unknowns than you have equations. Figuring out the values for x and y when you have x + y = 7 and x - y = 4 is easy*, but figuring out the values for x or y or z is impossible when you have x + y = 7 and x - z = 4. Three unknowns and two equations give you nothing but three unknowns and two equations.
That is what is happening with the Peace Bridge process: three unknowns, two equations.
They have teams studying bridge design and teams studying plaza design, but nobody is addressing directly the third and defining question: companion or substitute? The presence or absence of the old bridge drives everything. How can they possibly design bridge approaches and plazas and connecting roads when they don't know if they're building one bridge or if they're building half a bridge system? How can they possibly talk about the plaza if discussion of replacing the old bridge is politically verboten? What possible use can the projections of life cycle costs be if the secret given is that the old bridge must be maintained, whether for self-interest or sentimental reasons? How can these public meetings be anything other than window dressing if the key question, the political question, has already been determined by players not taking part at all in any of these discussions, workshops or votes?
The fate of the old bridge isn't something that will willy-nilly work itself out as the project lopes along. The warty old bridge, as the designs displayed in Workshop #3 so clearly indicate, is driving all the thinking on this project. There will be no clear thinking and rational decision making until the fate of the old bridge is clarified.
Is the old bridge sacred space, inviolate until it tumbles into the river of its own decrepitude? If so, then all discussion of liberation of occupied parkland in Buffalo is wasted time and air. Has the Buffalo and Fort Erie Public Bridge Authority ceded that issue? Then the citizens on this side of the border have a right to know that. Is there any point to these workshops and meetings? With that all-trumping wildcard hidden in someone's pocket, how can any of us possibly know?
* First you isolate either x or y, then substitute. If we isolate y, then the first equation becomes:
y = 7-x
plug that into the first equation
x-(7-x) = 4
get rid of the parenthesis:
2x-7 = 4
isolated the unknown by moving the 7 to the other side,
2x = 11
solve for x by dividing both sides by 2
x = 5.5
Solve for y by plugging 5.5 into either equation;
y = 1.5
But when you add the z, the third unknown, forget it. You're doomed to endless equations.