New Jersey Department of Transportation rejected warnings before 2021 I-295 retaining wall collapse

If you've driven to the shore from Philadelphia or come into the city from New Jersey in the past five years, you've probably driven past a retaining wall, known as Wall 22, as it's a major part of the I-295 Direct Connect Project. But on March 25, 2021, Wall 22 failed.
CBS News Philadelphia South Jersey Correspondent Brandon Goldner has been investigating for the last two years why Wall 22 failed and whether or not it could've been prevented.
See the documents uncovered in this investigation, including electronic communication between employees of the state and engineers, photos and more: www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/...
Extended behind-the-scenes content: • Wall 22: The rise, fal...
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[@fixieroy]

70,000 Fix turned into 92Million because warnings were ignored and not taken seriously....

[@Stan_in_Shelton_WA]

Different material or a geotextile to reduce later deformation. Seems simple if done at the correct time.

[@-Katastrophe]

Gotta love New Jersey

[@billkittleman9631]

What an absolute joke ….. but not surprising, of course .. 😞

[@tuck6464]

And everybody had a nice fat christmas / summer/whatever, except the people that ultimately pay for this nonsense.

[@rodneycabot356]

Man, if you can’t do it right, go back to dirt/rock roads.

[@danlowe8684]

What's hilarious is that after all of the evidence in hand, the DOT actually blamed the rain in its explanation.

[@MartysRandomStuff]

Heavy rain, how could they have ever expected that to happen? You expect engineers to account for something as rare as heavy rain? It's not like 42 ever floods during a thunderstorm, oh wait, yes, it happens all the time.

[@rileypup5959]

NJ DOT will soon blame it on Climate Change. Pure incompetence at the NJ DOT.

[@nicholastrawinski]

@@MartysRandomStuff its like the "Clarke and Dawe - The Front Fell Off" skit. NJDOT may as well be saying "the rain hit it, chance in a million..."

[@bighammer3464]

DOT- “We used material that is known to have poor properties when it gets wet but we couldn’t have foreseen that it would get wet. O well since we are the government we can’t foot the bill on this one and we can’t sue the contractor because he told us it would fail so we’ll just use more tax payer money to fix our own mistakes. O and no comment”

[@user-uo7fw5bo1o]

I remember a nationwide report of a huge rainstorm dropping 10 inches in this area. That was in _2004._ The DOT should have known in advance the failed structure wouldn't have been able to take inordinate amounts of rain.

[@potblack6043]

That reporter deserves a raise, he really put the investigating in investigative reporting.

[@robertwhiteside6865]

Please fire all those NJDOT people. First they refuse to listen to to prudent engineering concerns and now they ignore the public questions. They are supposed to be serving the public. They have no right to not inform the public. Fire them. They failed and replace them with competent forthright public servants.

[@PeterRabbitWhatsup]

biden gets his 10 percent along with the other politicians.

[@cf1885today]

lol. They will probably promote them and give them a bonus.

[@greglammers9905]

Nobody in government ever is held accountable.

[@timmym9149]

Yeah! Overpaid potato heads…much like the DMV

[@ChiefBridgeFuser]

Fired? Unlikely. See Fern Hollow Bridge collapse in Pittsburgh. Nobody fired or prosecuted. Paid off for the city too: saved money on maintenance and got the state to build them a new bridge.😮😢

[@williamsmith6235]

Anybody want to ask Governor Murphy why DOT refused a $70,000 fix and now must pay an additional $92 million to fix it ?

[@fredgardner2870]

Politicians will steal 70%

[@mprooveit3588]

"COVID" made everyone more stupid.

[@arlenbell4376]

Maybe take the $92 million out of NJDOT administrative budget.

[@blkcoupequattro]

Now it's it's going to cost $92,070,000.00. Main thing is the tear down, and rebuild as materials skyrocket in price not to mention fuel prices. That's going to cost 100,000,000.00 by the time they get around to it, and it does not take an engineer to point out building on sand like that is going to be an issue with all that weight of more sand.... lol You guys got bunch of sandbagger's over there on the east coast... lol

[@jasonsimpkins9069]

Because certain people are about to get rich by this.

[@MM-fe9mz]

Refused to spend 70k to have it later cost 90 million. Gotta love wasteful government spending

[@1pcfred]

No $70K was just how much it would have cost to draw up new plans. To execute that plan would have cost more.

[@spencers4121]

@@1pcfred Not from this video, they clearly say switching out the base material would cost 70K.

[@1pcfred]

@@spencers4121 no chance changing that would have only been a difference of $70K Believe me that $70K would only be for new plans. The work and materials cost more. Less than remediation and redoing it would though. But in plan B someone would have had to say they were wrong. That ain't happening today.

[@lelandunruh7896]

"A foolish man builds his retaining wall on I-11 sand." - Matthew 295

[@idiotsavant7276]

😂 👌🏻

[@user-xn3qm2il4l]

And the Lord did guffaw.

[@SDuapveer11]

I thought that that was what the priest was going to refer to.

[@Thumbhit1]

A foolish human believes in false books.

[@wandaherring7526]

Nice to see an actual reporter. Thank you.

[@JimmyJinIA]

What a nice thing to acknowledge a fellow co-workers diligence and perseverance. A classy shout out to a peer...well done sir.

[@VanillaMacaron551]

Bravo to the reporter. That's a lot of public money someone wasted. Next he needs to hit up the politicians responsible.

[@Kaptain.Obvious]

Someone at South State deserves a huge raise for saving company’s ars. In working over 40 years with commercial construction contractors I saw many many times where the “professionals” ignored contractors’ solid advice. Hubristic elites who rarely are held accountable.

[@billkittleman9631]

I’d be real curious to know if the T T’s builders back in the day strongly recommended sturdy i-beams for the horizontal floor supports, rather than the lightweight hat trusses chosen .. I suppose they still would’ve ultimately collapsed due to the structural integrity being fatally compromised to a large degree by the devastating impacts, but I’d have to believe they would have remained standing A LOT longer ..

[@pcluvvw7129]

Always put your concerns in communication emails. You know it will come back to bite you if you don't Document it.

[@july8xx]

One of the first things I learned in the army and then working for corporations is every thing you do treat like using a public toilet, CYAWP (COVER YOUR ASSETS WITH PAPER).

[@philly440]

I remember riding past this construction saying why do they think this sand is gonna hold up lol and I'm not even a engineer or contractor

[@SomeRandomHuman717]

The NJDOT bosses who thought it was too expensive to change the wall design---they used to work at the Maryland DOT in the department that decided it was too expensive to install dolphins in front of the Francis Scott Key bridge piers.

[@Lucky.Pasta1]

It was not just a "crystal ball." They understood the science of the materials and the contractor tried to warn them. Surprisingly, They documented it very well and it will likely protect their legal standing.

[@niyablake]

Not surprisingly. They knew it was l going to fail and it was CYA .

[@rosameryrojas-delcerro1059]

What had me rolling was that comment about the material used did not perform as expected.... YES it did, they said it wouldn't hold the wall up. The sand did exactly what they said it would do, and the wall went splat.

[@jafab5265]

The New Jersey DOT should be sued for their negligent behavior, for not adhering to the recommendations of the contractor and ultimately should pay for the entire rebuilding cost, and this reconstruction cost should not be passed on to the American taxpayers. Shame on you, New Jersey DOT, next time learn to listen and take the wax out of your ears. You dodged the bullet this time that no one was killed, but if there is a next time, I hope that you get sued for every nickel dime & penny, you have for your negligent behavior and poor judgment. 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬

[@mattbosley3531]

Why bother? Suing them is just taking money out of the taxpayers' pockets. And no state employees will get fired. I could have told you all of this without the two year investigation. They try to save some time or money and it ends up costing tens or hundreds of millions later.

[@walterspringer565]

Dig deep enough and you will find a political pal who made a great deal of money out of the use of inadequate material. Whoever is responsible never built sand castles at the shore.

[@neilkurzman4907]

Dig deep enough you’ll find politicians pandering to people like you trying to keep taxes low by not doing proper maintenance. well, all the people in New Jersey who were so concerned about their money being stolen paid an extra time $92 million

[@jakeringer3153]

The consultant who spec'd the "I-11" fill material should be held accountable also!

[@jeffreyc6508]

Who was the selling the " I 11" material, or did NJ DOT allready own it?

[@danielgardner2535]

Fantastic piece of investigative journalism. Bravo!!!

[@JamesAllmond]

Pretty sad when a contractor has to point out a problem to your DOT, that then gets ignored. In my state, generally, the other way around. Dang, $70,000 wise, $99,000,000 foolish... Sounds like a bad deal to me and literally could have been avoided. Makes you wonder who supplied to I-11 sand...

[@hosta3199]

Department of transportation needs to be held accountable. Taxpayers should not pay for the stupidity of engineers failure when they were warned

[@AutoReport1]

And how are taxpayers not going to pay for it? Not as if Jersey DOT has private funding to reimburse taxpayers. Nor can you sue the staff for being pennywise and pound foolish. The best you can hope for is some layoffs and maybe a culture change if you're lucky.

[@GeorgeBenedictBaldwin]

Engineering might not have been done or simply ignored. The evidence holds.

[@j22mattones]

As an architect, a former general contractor, and a project manager on projects up to $180M, the fact that this small section of highway is going to take 4 years and $90M to replace reaks of corruption. 2 bridges, addition of highway systems, and reworking of existing highway systems in the Louisville, KY area took 2 years. I could have that retaining wall project completed in 12-15 months tops, and at a fraction of that budget. At most, that should cost about $10M. I'm so glad I no longer live in the North East. I remember when I-84 in CT, from Waterbury, West took most of my childhood for them to complete. There were more days when there weren't people working than when there were. Yes, bureaucracies play a role in increased budgets and increased timeframes, but corrupt unions (I'm not knocking the MANY great unions that exist), corrupt politicians, all have their fingers in that pot of money and make these projects hurt the taxpayers. Follow the money!

[@arthouston7361]

So...as a former broadcaster in town, let me be the one to ask...whose head will be rolling at the NJDOT as a result of ignoring the warnings from the contractor?

[@Flatfourdetailing]

70k fix to $92 million is crazy.

[@oldfarmer4700]

When your spending tax payers money who care except the ones having to hand over the money. DOT is also paid by tax payers and refused to comment, since when do they think they can not answer to the ones paying their pay checks. You think the system is corrupt and crooked. Oh yeah it is.

[@dabprod]

No surprise here. It's Jersey........

[@moman19701]

maybe they should raise property taxes more to pay for the repairs and give the NJDOT raises for the extra work to do it twice.

[@dabprod]

@@moman19701 How about fire and jail the DOT.

[@williamheber2118]

Welcome to New Jersey where NO ONE goes to jail LOL!

[@highline64]

DOT engineers do not make mistakes. Just ask them. They’re all the same cocky and arrogant.

[@004Black]

I love it. I live in Michigan and a portion of my income tax will rebuild an I-295 retaining wall. Why? Some bureaucrats didn’t want to listen to engineers and pony up just .07% of $92.0M to rework the design. Makes sense to me.

[@darfliter1222]

South State over the years, has done excellent work around our area. Sometimes the contractor in these situations, is more of the expert than the ones running the jobs. Maybe the swelled heads that made the call, should be fired for costing tax payers the flaw in design.

[@haplessasshole9615]

I'm a writer, so of course I had to pause and check out more than the highlighted phrases in South State's correspondence. Whoever composed those letters did a dynamite job of using strong, value-laden words and specific legal terminology. Somebody on their team really knows how to write.

[@reubensandwich9249]

The contractor is primarily looking for a change order to make more money. NJDOT hired an engineer, the engineering firm disagreed.

[@niyablake]

@@reubensandwich9249 or they have been doing it long enough to know I-11 was the wrong type or they have their own engineers how told t hem it was the wrong soil. If it was just about a change order to make money then they would have kept their mouths sh and waited for the wall o fail

[@russcrawford3310]

Not a crystal ball ... it was math ...

[@Failure_Is_An_Option]

Not math.

[@runuphill]

@@Failure_Is_An_Option -- Physics.

[@flowalsh5248]

I find it pretty sad. That people were warned, nobody listened. I believe isn’t it the Governor job to do something about stuff like this. What a big waste of taxpayers money. No wonder why the income taxes are so high there and nobody can afford to live. Because they are throwing away money.

[@gregggoss2210]

Our very worthless governor.

[@jamiebray8532]

WOW that $70,000 doesn't seem like that much money now, does it NJDOT? I do believe there are some DOT suits that should be passing out resumes imo.

[@celticman1909]

Usually it's the DOT that has to police the contractor........wow!

[@unconventionalideas5683]

This is disgusting. We would be outraged if it were a private company building a toll road that did this, and we should be equally outraged at NJDOT and any legislators and the pressures they may have faced, or the Governor's Office if it somehow is responsible. Edit: wrote legislatures instead of legislators...

[@clydedenby1436]

The cost should be placed at the feet of the engineers who sighed off on it.

[@andreac3362]

Are you sure they were engineers?

[@SilvaDreams]

It was the engineers that said it was being done wrong.. It was the NJDOT that waved them off.

[@user-yo1pk4ky4k]

Yes, sand under a big retaining wall "did not perform as expected." Or it did perform as expect by warnings sent to the DOT.

[@davidpawson9047]

Sounds like another case of "Say something, we'll ignore something."

[@jasonsimpkins9069]

I knew after the 1st year of that whole construction that somethings not right. I was traveling through there about 7 years and wasn't even close to finish. And what they did made things 1000x worse. The whole area is a nightmare

[@ziggylycans]

you nailed the narration of "its like they had a crystal ball" had me rolling had to rewind.

[@rosameryrojas-delcerro1059]

What had me rolling was that comment about the material used did not perform as expected.... YES it did, they said it wouldn't hold the wall up. The sand did exactly what they said it would do, and the wall went splat.

[@tjav001]

Props to the actual journalist that researched this. He actually did some work.

[@nickjw88]

There was a time when media outlets, especially newspapers, actually paid journalists to do good in depth reporting.

[@VanillaMacaron551]

Yes so sad that a kid has to give up his own time for work! Journalism can suck as a job.

[@jimmiller5600]

Now they're the LSM.

[@railfandepotproductions]

​@@jimmiller5600the hell is LSM?

[@jimmiller5600]

@@railfandepotproductions What biased, fact-free people use to describe "Lame Stream Media"

[@railfandepotproductions]

@@jimmiller5600 you apart of these biased fact free people?

[@trevormcmanis]

And this is why government will never be able to compete with the private sector. The private sector knows what they're doing.....

[@WALTERBROADDUS]

Who was the Geotechnical Engineering firm?

[@jimklapperich]

I would like to see the breakdown on why it would cost $92,000,000 to fix it.

[@davem6685]

Prevailing wage rates. Private contractor could do it for half that amount.

[@madjack8893]

Exactly more like 42 mil and 50 for the politicians.

[@amiddleagedparkrat]

Sounds about right. We have the same problem in PA when it comes to people in power routinely ignoring credible feedback from the public because that would require them to actually work for a living.

[@yeshuaiscomingbackrepent2357]

Actually...the material supporting the wall preformed EXACTLY as expected... according to the CONTRACTOR who WARNED them way in advance. My prayer is the DOT people, and city people who would not LISTEN will NOT get away with it AND also lose their jobs and ALL credibility.

[@NortheastAndRetired]

Great Reporting!!! Very Interesting

[@twitchell2682]

I like how they slid in the fact that CBS didnt want him to do the journalism.

[@zLigHt44]

This could have caused a major loss of life down the road.... taxpayers are the victims here, I would think that a loss of your position and retirement is apparently justified and maybe some jail time as well, local, state and federal employees need to be held accountable, before they destroy this once great country completely.

[@InternetKilledTV21]

Someone at NJDOT _definitely_ gave the I-11 contract to their buddy. There's no way something like this gets complained about for years by the _contractor_ without some impropriety afoot.

[@user-wl1yr6zw3w]

92 million? You've got to be joking. Dept of Transportation needs to be investigated.

[@ChristianWagner888]

The Bible also says not to build on sand, because when the rain comes, great will be the fall. - Excellent journalistic research and you interviewed my favorite engineer!

[@tylerty3368]

Great coverage Brandon!

[@js4folk]

Thank You Brandon! Well Done and keep pushing. We need more like you in the profession!!!

[@islandicedragon]

Government bureaucracy some official probably got a good job for saving $70,000, is now getting yelled at for wasting $92 million.

[@kolsen6330]

I inspected a crane near my house on a highway widening project. I mentioned that one cut into a hill had lots of hydraulic pressure behind it and expressed my surprise that the new wall had no drainage like the old one. Pointed out all the springs on the hillside and told them that 20 years earlier the first try at a wall there had collapsed. Driving past the construction site a couple of weeks later, they had 2 cranes (which I pulled the state cert on when I got to the office) RT forklifts and excavators trying to hold the wall up. They finally gave up and let it crash. Wall V2 had large drainage tiles going back into the hillside. They didnt even look at reports from the first time apparently. Almost 4 wasted months building the first wall, cleaning up the ruins when it came down and building a new wall. Engineers very rarely listen to contractors and workers.

[@bordereau1]

Bravo Brandon! An excellent piece of journalism!!! You are a true reporter and they are a rarity indeed!!!

[@HHH-ye1ro]

1:27 “miss, you’re gonna be on TV.” “Great. I’ll get get dressed and look my best.” 😂😂

[@GreyMatterEnergy]

Shouldn't the company who held the tender to build this be responsible? The politicians who ignored warnings should be held liable.

[@idiotsavant7276]

Documentation folks! If you’re working on city, state, or federal construction projects, having a paper trail can literally save you from becoming a scapegoat and going to federal prison. If it wasn’t for emails with written concerns, the state could have easily turned around and blamed the builder and found no fault in its design.

[@experimenting8174]

The real outrage should be that it costs ONE BILLION DOLLARS to build an interchange!!

[@loganskiwyse7823]

Reminds me of a tower in SF. Stop letting projects like this happen. As a country we should be better than this.

[@mofbombay6290]

70,000 to redraw the plans ? All they had to do was change specifications of the fill material .

[@marypasco2213]

Wonder who's getting the kick-backs?

[@davidhenderson3400]

contractors are known for cutting corners but when even they are telling you it will not hold you had better listen to them. Good thing South State covered their rear with a mountain of paper work for when it did fail. I hope some one at South State called the NJ DOT and said "I told you so."

[@king_tut.]

Wtf, 92 million. Yeah right..

[@polojoe2835]

SHEEP !!! 🐑🐑🐑🐑🐑

[@JackReacheround]

Gotta tear down and redo that whole section built on top of sand, not just the one wall area.

[@spencers4121]

It has to be torn down and fixed, basically build it twice. Lucky for the contractor they covered their butts. this is 100% on DOT.

[@CaseyJones-Engineer]

Great job Brandon digging up all of this correspondence! It is quite eye-opening.

[@kaiserroll1323]

Public problem with corporate accountability?? DEFLECT BLAME

[@rcampbell4967]

What's not clear in this story is WHO drew the designs? Was it the NJ DOT or an engineering firm? Ultimately, the engineer who specified sand is responsible for the failure. If it was an engineering firm, the DOT should seek to collect damages from the firms insurance company. If not, the DOT engineer and his supervisor should be terminated; even the contractor knew sand was innapropriate.

[@justtubing767]

It's hard to believe the DOT would tell the engineers and contractors that they are wrong is just unfathomable. This seems criminal at this point.

[@TomAlger.]

Thanks for the report!

[@susanmeanslily]

Excellent reporting!

[@skyfly200]

You better have paid that reporter for all that work "on his own time"

[@l.ls.8890]

The sad thing about all this is, no one will be held accountable in the NJ management.

[@mineown1861]

Full marks to the contractor , a failing mark to NJDOT and the design engineer. Despite the warnings , they turn around and blame the collapse on the rain and material not behaving as expected . Firstly , it's NJ , it rains , and secondly, the material seems to have performed just as expected by the contractor. Still, DOT did save taxpayers $70k by refusing to heed the contractors advice , though that is a drop in a $92million bucket.

[@dodginglions5163]

Great reporting!…thanks for making this video!😎

[@madjack8893]

Pay your reporter. He’s a good one. Don’t lose him.

[@vinniegillotti9347]

People of New Jersey should not spend another dime on that and it sure hell is up to the United States taxpayers to pay for New Jersey’s ignorance because they didn’t listen to the engineers that fault 100% on the department of transportation, plane and simple don’t expect the taxpayers of the country to bail you out of your build back better plan

[@TGears314]

Gotta love Brady from Practical Engineering!! He’s awesome, one of the reasons I’m a mechanical engineer myself. And I remember the video he posted and immediately thought of the lessons from that video when I watched this one! I’m amazed he’s in the video and I really think it’s good he’s spreading information like this

[@thedrabfour]

Great report Brandon.

[@bluemantom77]

I live in New York the nysdot does the same thing here always mistakes and oversight issues I personally think all these states need an oversight from the government end of story

[@GeorgeBenedictBaldwin]

My Dad always taught me, Do it right the first time so you don't have to tear it down and do it again.

[@DurgaUsagi]

92million to build a retaining wall.....gurrrl. THERES NO EFFIN WAYYYYYY.

[@frankmartin8471]

They saved $70,000, temporarily. Then comes the cost of not doing it right the first time. A retaining wall is supposed to take weather conditions into account, because retaining walls are located outside, in the weather, whatever it may be.

[@smunro851]

The taxpayers are already footing the original bill. How about someone else pay for it

[@smc4229]

Hey great to see Grady from Practical Engineering

[@Vito_993]

Why would taxpayers have to pay for it they fk up not us

[@Lakeman3211]

As a contractor who both engineers and installs retaining systems…I am skeptical of the explanation offered by The New Jersey DOT as they were notified of the pending risk, the walls foundation likely is still in place and adequate drain capable substrate and evacuation ducting/drains..the backfill material utilized was a non locking, and saturable stock…the only method this could fail…the foundation of the wall appears to be a minor portion and horizontal failure the principal issue…DOT failed, but they are a governmental agency and basically immune….

[@rollinwithunclepete824]

So no one told NJ DOT that is rains in South Jersey. It is the TV weather man's fault!

[@gantmj]

And it's just sitting there still why? Government is why. They have no incentive to accomplish anything.

[@scotthester2189]

Now that it’s collapsed , $70;000.00 sounds like a steal of a deal to fix the error in hindsight.

[@richardross7219]

Good job Brandon. I'm a retired civil engineer. It looked to me like a foundation failure in the photo at 01:31. The top of the wall looks tipped back into the retained soil and the bottom looks like it was pushed out. This would indecate a "slip circle" type failure. I've seen it before where a filled block retaining wall failed because of a poor foundation. General incompetence on the government's part. Good Luck, Rick

[@WALTERBROADDUS]

Who had the geotechnical inspection on this project?

[@richardross7219]

@@WALTERBROADDUS I'm not in that area and I've been retired for 13 years, so I know nothing more than the video. Good Luck, Rick

[@WALTERBROADDUS]

@@richardross7219 👷🏽‍♂️I am out of the industry now also. Was wondering if any of my old employers helped this mess?

[@richardross7219]

@@WALTERBROADDUS I got my MSCE in geotechnical but only worked as a regular civil. I have out lived my engineering friends so, I don't hear much except from YT. If you are retired, congratulations. Good Luck, Rick

[@GalileonPrime]

Hah! Tofu construction. Heads should roll.

[@louistitano4069]

there will be no one held accountable...of course they knew, they will deflect away from all internal evidence that they knew and more than likely get a bonus or retire. Shameful

[@billbowers7553]

This is why a free press is so important. Go get em....

[@jimmiller5600]

Yes, the embankment material performed exactly as expected. Gravity works, all day long. And yes, it rains in NJ.

[@Joemama-crzy]

No accountability anywhere in government, just charge the taxpayers

[@SM-vs4ro]

All that discarded the contractor concerns should be prosecuted and lose all benefits.

[@jimwinchester339]

0:21 That price tage is utterly ridiculous! $92m for a pile of dirt, some large interlocking concrete bricks, some posts, etc.? They can re-use the main girders and guardrail iron, and maybe even entire pavement sections.

[@dave-in-nj9393]

I remember my brother driving through the conation of this area. I just drove through the construction still going on in this area area a month ago. so, when he was 16, that was. 1953+16 = 1969... construction of this roadway has been ongoing for 50 years.