April 2021 – Balaratna the Builder

Falling Bridges and the Author’s Reflection

One of the most extraordinary features of my mind is that I can remember anything in detail from my early days. I can remember riding on Thomas the Tank Engine at the age of 21 months, but I can also vividly remember watching the desolation left by the 2004 tsunami on television with my grandfather, who saw many of his memories washed away by the wave. I can remember going on amazing road trips all around the country’s infrastructure in my toddler years, but I also remember this.

Even though I was not at the site, my five-year-old self watched in horror as our television displayed the aftermath of a major interstate bridge collapse in Minneapolis. This catastrophic failure in the bridge’s structure claimed the lives of thirteen people and injured over a hundred.

To this day, I usually think of those people whenever I cross over a highway bridge. This event showed me the effects of neglect in the world. I felt that this would be a disaster that occurred once, but there are far too many structures in this country that could meet a similar fate.

This is the Delaware River Turnpike Toll Bridge, and it provides a vital link between the states of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. I have crossed over it many times to reach New York, and some of my classmates in high school travelled on it every day. Their commute times increased exponentially when a structural failure closed the bridge for several months in the winter of 2017.

Upon further examination, a completely fractured I-Beam support can be observed in this photo of the bridge’s approach structure. It was calculated that this break caused the approach of the bridge to sag one inch below its original height. This may not seem like a significant amount, but this was truly an averted crisis. The country could have lost one of its most important bridges and several lives with it. Emergency supports were immediately put into place to correct the integrity of the bridge, and the structure was immediately closed to road traffic. Repairs took several months and road traffic was significantly inconvenienced by this failure. It was reported that the failure was most likely caused by a stress fracture brought about from an improper I-Beam weld repair from the bridge’s construction in the 1950s. Although no lives were lost, and the bridge is now operating normally, this situation serves as a worrying reminder of the condition of many American bridges.

The American Society of Civil Engineers gives American bridges an overall condition grading of C.

The ASCE also reports that 7.5 percent of the country’s bridges can be classified as structurally deficient, and 178 million trips are made by Americans across these hazards daily. This seems like an accident waiting to happen, but most people continue to ignore this growing issue. Even when collapses occur like the 2007 Minneapolis Bridge failure, no adequate solution is provided for this problem.

Even the most iconic structures in our country fall victim to age and the elements.

As beautiful as the Golden Gate Bridge may be, its location makes it the victim of salt corrosion. In 1968, the bridge faced a major corrosion problem, and a twenty-seven year long program was adopted to repaint the bridge.

The major issue that bridges present is the expense of repairs. Additionally, these repairs take extensive amounts of time to carry out and often cause major detours for Americans on the roads.

However, if these repairs are not done now, the country’s roads will be a much more dangerous place in the future.

A Review of the Semester

I felt that I gained a deeper understanding of the nation’s infrastructure network through writing these blogs. I realize that most of my blogs were written about railroads, but they were still informative nevertheless. My work on this blog also put me in a good position to research the topics related to my issue brief and advocacy project. I have become a more informed citizen because of my work, and I hope that I have been able to enlighten you too.

The Timeline that Almost Never Happened

Whenever I need a hat for blocking out the sun or my bad hair days, I can always rely on my Prep Crew baseball hat. Not only is it one of the few hats that can comfortably stretch over my enormous head, but it also serves as a lesson for me to keep my mind open. That hat reminds me of my initial path through high school

I could have been winning Stotesbury on the Schuylkill instead of building sets. As a high school freshman, I was fully invested in my school’s renown rowing program. We practiced every day after school, and most days were either spent on the river or running sprints up and down the Philadelphia Art Museum Steps for hours.

I can’t watch Rocky movies anymore because of the exhaustion those steps brought me, but even with this overworking, I was still fueled by one promising end product of the program. Prep Crew Seniors always won their regattas and got recruited by the Ivy Leagues.

I wished so much for this to be my destiny, but after winter workouts, I realized that I would never find fulfillment in endlessly grinding on ergs and doing solely rowing related activities to get into an elite university. I dropped from the roster and I worked to create a new path for myself.

I would not have imagined myself being in my current position four years ago, but was the path to the present worth it?

Even though all of my friends from crew went to Yale, Penn, and Princeton, I never looked back. I made sure to fully reap the benefits of my new path, and I can now say that I achieved this goal. If you learned anything from this blog, it is that I have built things and pushed through ordeals that seemed impossible. The demands were as high or even more than those rowing presented, but I had more fun than I ever would have being yelled at by my coxswain on a fifteen-mile run during practice.

I made more friends and built more relationships than I could have ever imagined. We all worked as a fine-oiled machine and we had a genuinely fun time with each other.

Looking at these memories of stage crew and light managing now makes them seem like they were all part of a dream. They are so far, yet so close to my heart. I miss the program tremendously, and I have no regrets.

I could have been typing this blog from a dorm in Harvard Yard if my situation played out differently, but I cannot imagine the person I would be if that were the case. Sometimes the most rewarding experiences reveal themselves in the most surprising ways.

With these thoughts, it is time to close the curtain on this passion blog series. I hope you have had as much fun reading them as I had writing them.

Hell Week

Sometimes the hardest of times bring about the best of memories. This was especially true for the tech and production weeks during show productions. After the set was completed, the cast was moved onto stage, and the main planning of the show began.

I took up my position at the light board on the director’s table, and the grind started.

Tech for a show is one of the most tedious processes I have ever experienced. The directors, tech crew, and cast start the show from page one and move through the entirety of the run over a week, as each scene change, prop transfer, lighting and sound cue, and line is crafted and optimized. It is a slow, yet efficient method, as each component of the show is thoroughly tested to create the best results. Some parts of the show are ruthlessly slimmed down, while supplements are added to other portions. It is important to remain concentrated, as you never know what can be changed.

As boring as tech may be at some points, it is still one of my favorite parts of show production. At my position in the rear of the theater with the director’s, comic relief and junk food remains a high priority through the daily four-hour-long rehearsals. Swedish Fish and Twizzlers became an integral part of my diet during those rehearsals, and the excess sugar led to animated conversations between the tech crews and the directors. Points of interest included perfectly-timed one-liners about screw ups during tech, gossip about the school administration, and the 1980s. It was a time of good feelings before hell week.

The Sunday before opening night, I would move the board back up to the light booth and entrench with the crew for the long days ahead. The five days before opening night on Friday would consist of seven-hour-long rehearsals every day, where full dress rehearsals of the show were tested under authentic conditions.

Our vigilance during tech was put to the test, as each scene was run at a normal pace without stops. The heaviest burden was placed on the actors, but the lighting and run crews needed to ensure that they were provided with the best conditions to become comfortable for the run.

Rehearsals would end at 11 pm and everyone rushed to get home as soon as possible for some precious sleep. It usually took me an average of forty to fifty minutes to drive from my school to my home. My record at this late hour was a breathtaking 19 minutes. I may have gone slightly over the speed limit, but I needed to get rest before showtime.

Tech and production weeks are important aspects of a show for two reasons: the physical and mental preparation. The show is carefully orchestrated at this point, and the entire team takes up the demanding showtime mindset. They may have been ridiculous to live through, but the strengthened focus and perseverance that I gained from them are invaluable qualities.

Side Hustles

Stage crew may have been a very demanding job during shows builds and during productions, but there were also long periods of time were little to now work was required. During the winter and summer months, no sets are requested by the program, so stage crew members go into the offseason, grinding through resources kept from the previous show.

The amount of lumber our program purchases for shows is astounding, and even though we reuse most of our supplies, the remainder of the stockpile is left with an uncertain fate. The climate control in our antiquated theater is effectively nonexistent. This means that most wood products will severely warp due to temperature changes, if they are stored backstage for long periods of time. Why waste a forest when you can give it to a group of teenagers to use?

I realized the full potential of this surplus during my senior year, and I ended up using it for several projects for school and personal use.

I was enrolled in AP Physics C my senior year, which had a project-based lab component. Each academic quarter had a new build, ranging from bridges to a radio. Using my construction savvy and excess materials, I was able to craft some memorable products.

The bridge

Saw work on a small scale is incredibly difficult, and the bridge project only reinforced this point. Our first lab was the iconic bridge breaking scenario, where our groups needed to achieve the highest payload to bridge weight ratio as possible. This required me to cut a span with several jigsaw cutters, while ensuring that the powerful tool did not shred my thin span to splinters. Thankfully, I had been working with the jigsaw for several years, so I was able to safely cut a span that satisfied the weight limit.

The Guitar:

This one was my favorite project

Our second lab assignment required the class to form bands with fully-functional instruments. I have played the guitar for over a decade, so I felt that it would be fun for me to make my own guitar.

I immediately raided the stage crew surplus and put together the basic structure using 1x4s and lauan plywood. I sanded the neck from a regular 2×4 and then used wood stain to give the instrument a traditional livery.

This strings were incredibly difficult to mount and properly tune, but I eventually had a working instrument in the workshop. It may not stay in tune for extended periods of time, but there is no doubt that it can still play lovely music.

It is wonderful that our wood, which was slated for the dumpster, could be repurposed into our side projects. It made stage crew into a year-long hobby.