President Joe Biden said Tuesday he has directed a team to “move heaven and earth” to rebuild Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge and reopen the port after its early morning collapse.
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President Joe Biden on Tuesday urged his team to “move heaven and earth” to rebuild and reopen the port after the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore collapsed after being hit by a container ship early Tuesday morning. He said he gave instructions.
Biden said the federal government plans to pay for all of the rebuilding costs.
Biden said shipping traffic in the Port of Baltimore has been suspended until the strait can be cleared.
He called the port “the number one import and export port in the United States for both automobiles and light trucks, with approximately 850,000 vehicles passing through the port each year.” And we'll get it back up and running as soon as possible. ”
He noted that 15,000 jobs “depend on that port.” And we're going to do everything we can to protect those jobs and help those workers. ”
He said the Army Corps of Engineers will be there to assist with clearing the waterway.
“As I told Governor (of Maryland) Moore, I am directing my team to move heaven and earth to reopen our ports and rebuild our bridges as soon as humanely possible.”
Biden also said, “It is his intention that the federal government pays for the entire cost of rebuilding that bridge.” And I hope Congress will support my efforts. ”
“It's going to take time,” Biden said. “The people of Baltimore expect us to be there for them every step of the way.”
Asked whether the company that operated the ship that hit the bridge should pay for the damages, Biden said: We're going to pay to rebuild and reopen the bridge. ”
The president said he intended to travel to Baltimore “as soon as possible.”
Watch Biden's full remarks below.
“One of America's infrastructure cathedrals”
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg joined Maryland Gov. Wes Moore Tuesday afternoon to offer support and note that rebuilding will not be an easy task.
“This is no ordinary bridge. This is one of America's infrastructure cathedrals,” Buttigieg said at a news conference in Baltimore. “It's been part of this area's skyline for longer than many of us have been alive.”
“So the road to normalcy will not be easy. It won't be fast. It won't be cheap, but let's rebuild together.”
Buttigieg said the Maritime Administration will help operate ports and supply chains.
He said the Federal Highway Administration will assist with the bridge itself and any other ways “that can alleviate congestion for residents and commuters who no longer have access to this thoroughfare.”
“The Federal Aviation Administration is also involved in efforts to keep the airspace above the bridge clear for emergency personnel.”
The Spirit of “One Maryland”
It was a tough day in the Maryland General Assembly on Tuesday as lawmakers grappled with the fallout from the collapse of the Key Bridge in Baltimore.
Cllr Mark Corman, chair of the Environment and Transportation Committee, opened Tuesday's meeting by telling his colleagues: “Our thoughts are with the families directly affected and the incredible first responders who rushed in the middle of the night to save lives.” ”
In a subsequent interview with WTOP, Corman said that while there may be disagreements among lawmakers, “there's kind of a 'One Maryland' mentality here, and it's not a very large state.” He explained.
He added: “We've all driven across Key Bridge and know people who live around it.”
Asked about the impact of the Biden administration's pledge to get Congressional approval for bridge replacement costs, Corman said it would help. He said that while “in the immediate aftermath” of the bridge collapse, “of course you're going to want to rebuild. Baltimore is a resilient city and Maryland is resilient, so we're going to move forward with the recovery.” “But it will take time for it to take root,” he said.
Meanwhile, the General Assembly faces an April 1 budget deadline, and Corman said there will be discussions about how to deal with a shortfall of about $3 billion over six years. Corman said Congress has been working to solve the problem of providing “the infrastructure funding that Maryland needs for the infrastructure that it wants.”
Things you can consider when rebuilding a bridge
Built decades ago, the bridge lacked several improvements developed over the years to make the structure safer. Some bridges have protection near the supports to deflect some of the impact from possible collisions with ships.
“We won't know for some time what protections had been approved for the bridge structure that could have prevented this from happening, but we believe it is a mistake,” said Rick Geddes, an infrastructure policy expert and director of infrastructure policy at Cornell University. It would have been helpful,” he said. he told Mike Murillo of the program WTOP.
He said the focus should be on improving protection against ship-bridge collisions, as sensors embedded in bridges can communicate with approaching ships.
Other available sensors can alert authorities to structural problems before catastrophic failure occurs.
“What they tell us is vibration, temperature, alkalinity in the concrete,” Geddes said.
He noted that other states have relied on public-private partnerships to rebuild and maintain bridges that have been rebuilt after disasters, and said paying for the project is still up for discussion.
Geddes is also calling on lawmakers to consider infrastructure funding to help pay for improvements and works to protect bridges from potential threats, both natural and man-made.
“We need to focus on improving the resiliency of our infrastructure. That could be redundancy built into the design and construction of our infrastructure.”
WTOP's Kate Ryan, Mike Murillo and Jessica Kronzer and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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