A GREAT WHITE ELEPHANT.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9588, 7 September 1909, Page 7

A GREAT WHITE ELEPHANT.

* New York has a white elephant before which the whitest of New Zealand bred animals must hang its head in shame. The Qeens borough bridge, erected over the East river and opened in April last, cost'l7,"00,000 dollars. There are only four bridges in existence with a longer span than the biggest of this immense steel structure. But the bridge has one trifling drawback—it is unsafe. L'he collapse of the Quebec bridge in 1907, a structure of the same type as the Queensborough bridge, caused so much uneasiness in New York that the authorities were compelled to have an investigation made. A firm of consulting engineers and a well-known professor of engineering were commissioned to make independent examinations, and both reports condemned the bridge. Ordinary structural steel was found to be subjected to stresses of 24,000 pounds per square inch, which is beyond the limit of safety. Some parts had to carry 30,000 pounds to the square, or 25 per cent, beyond the limit already declared dangerous. Professor Burr found that various parts of the bridge were carrying from 10 to 33 per cent, too much weight. The investigators considered that if a certain amount of dead weight were removed the city might risk opening it to pedestrians and highway and tramcar traffic, provided one car did not follow another too closly. Stretching the limit of safety to the utmost, the bridge cannot carry more than a third of the traffic for which it was intended. The weakness of the bridge has made it one of the most fascinating spots in the metropolis to those who like thrills. Every Sunday 100,000 people promenade it, some oven running up and down to see if the condemned thing will break under their weight. A sarcastic American writer remarks that as the bridge continues to stand uiT'er this treatment, at.y New Yorker who is disposed may boast about it. Four millions sterling is rather a stiff price to pay for a promenade.