News stories that East Bay progressives and environmentalists shouldn’t miss:
1. A respected longtime metallurgist has concluded that more giant bolts on the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge will likely snap in the years ahead and that Caltrans should replace them, the CoCo Times reports. Yun Chung, who specializes in high-strength steel analysis and was a longtime engineer for Bechtel, also blamed CalTrans for the fact that more than thirty of the massive bolts, which are designed to help the new bridge withstand a major earthquake, have already failed — rather than the bolt supplier Dyson Corporation of Ohio. However, it’s unclear whether CalTrans can replace the big bolts as Chung recommends because the bridge’s roadbed has already been installed.