Top 10 Craziest "Bridges to Nowhere"

[@MaxTSanches]

In the 1960s my dad drove us through Seatle Washington, and on the I5 there were many of these 'bridges to nowhere'. When I went through there in the 2000s all of them had been connected. This must have saved a lot of money and planning headaches. :)

[@anthonybanchero3072]

Last one, in the arboretum, was recently demolished.

[@ELMS]

I remember seeing those! As I recall, most of them were left hand exits and some were bloody high!

[@boxsterman77]

Sunk costs alone is never a good reason to continue a project.

[@BuildingTales]

Agreed!

[@kazikian]

Regarding the one in WV. Why don’t we build tunnels in the USA? We create these insane rock cuts instead.

[@cpufreak101]

To put it simply, cost. It's often cheaper to do cuts like that instead of tunnels. If you're at all familiar with the PA turnpike, multiple sections have been bypassed over the years due to the costs of realignment being cheaper than the costs of trying to build another tunnel, and apparently there's currently plans for the Allegheny mountain tunnel to be bypassed as well as the cost of *repairing* the existing tunnels is greater than the cost of realignment

[@pulaski1]

[1] Land in the US is cheap, often near worthless in mountains, [2] the rock may be soft/ unstable or the region subject to earthquakes or land slides, [3] making a cutting is relatively low tech and easy, you just need lots of heavy excavators, rock trucks, and some explosives (all of which are readily available in the US) - designing and digging a tunnel is much more complex, usually requiring custom boring machines, [4] to make a near-horizontal tunnel may mean a tunnel many miles long, so massively expensive, so it is cheaper to climb higher and _over_ a mountain, making some cuttings through the ridges, [4] American cars are more powerful than in most other countries, so cruising up a mountain road in your 250hp-400+hp SUV isn't a big deal compared to the same drive in an 80hp subcompact car, which is slow and noisy.

[@kazikian]

@@pulaski1 All true. It’s just sad. In Europe they build tunnels like crazy.

[@kazikian]

@@cpufreak101 I find it upsetting. Tunnels are cool!

[@pulaski1]

@kazikian I'm not super excited by tunnels. I went through the (English) Channel Tunnel once (on a vehicle train, the coach I was on just drove right on to the enclosed carriage) I was underwhelmed. I've been through several of the Swiss mountain tunnels many times, mostly the St Gotthard, and mostly on a coach; I've driven myself through those long tunnels a few times, but it really isn't fun. On one occasion traffic was held inside the northern end of the St Gotthard tunnel because of a snow storm, and I was able to get out of the coach and walk around - that tunnel is _massive_ probably 30ft/10m high inside! My FIL used to work (safety and maintenance crew) on the Big Walker Mountain I77 tunnel on the VA-WV border.

[@dorianjenneker]

🇿🇦 Couldn’t help but smile when I saw the thumbnail - my home town! The Foreshore Bypass is often used by photographers and videographers these days because of the unique backdrop it provides: Table Mountain and the Cape Town skyline.

[@johnblaiklock702]

An unusual one in the UK is the Lichfield Canal Aqueduct over the M6 Toll. It's an aqueduct rather than a bridge, but has no canal connecting to it on either side.

[@BuildingTales]

Very interesting one, Thanks for bringing it to my attention!

[@Spookieham]

In Glasgow, Scotland there are 2 ramps that stop in mid air south of the Kingston Bridge. There were for a new motorway that was only built 40 years later that ironically STILL doesnt connect directly to the bridge which is less than a hundred metrrs away.

[@msyoungau]

I wonder if the viaduct near Menangle in NSW is considered a bridge to nowhere? It was part of the Maldon to Dombarton Rail Link that was started in the early 80's but never completed.

[@fanOfMinecraft-UAs_channel]

My favourite bridge to nowhere is the unfinished tram bridge in my city, Lviv, as a part of an unbuilt addition to the 3rd line

[@BuildingTales]

I'll definitely check that one out!

[@francoisfortin5826]

What not the "l'atoroute Duffrene" in Quebec city It ended up on a rock face !!!!! It was on pillars in the city

[@B-and-O-Operator-Fairmont]

I remember seeing a bit of a closed off "off ramp" on the Fort Duquesne Bridge over the old Three Rivers Stadium parking lot in the 1970s. It took a while but circa 1985 I-279 (The Parkway North) made use of that truncated "off ramp". I-279 had been in the planning stages for decades, so that explains the Fort Duquesne Bridge being built the way it was. I suppose any time a "bridge to nowhere" is found, there may be a distant future use already planned for it.

[@BuildingTales]

Yep! Definitely not a total lost cause if the original plans don’t work out… sometimes they can be repurposed pretty successfully!

[@LawpickingLocksmith]

You forgot the Pambam bridge replacement. Just for 1 annual festival it is surely odd.

[@elwoodblues9613]

I was hoping that SoCal's Bridge To Nowhere would be on here. And it is: 5:21. It's the most famous, most popular hike in the Los Angeles Basin. There is *NO* maintained trail to the bridge, so follow the river the best you can. Those who have come before you have left markings of which way to go.

[@Ruffi0]

The WV one is not a waste. And it’s continuing. It’s will save a massive amount of time.

[@BuildingTales]

Agree to disagree!

[@joestrike8537]

Wasn't there a bridge to nowhere in Alaska? I seem to remember it being an issue when Alaska governor Sarah Palin was running for VP on John McCain's presidential capaign.

[@boxsterman77]

Good memory.

[@boxsterman77]

Sarah was making a deal about the haphazard way we throw huge sums of money and infrastructure projects without considering whom was served. Like all things Palin, it was a glib and not well researched swipe because it was soon revealed that probably the worst example occurred in AK while she was the Gov who signed off on AKs contribution to the project.

[@BuildingTales]

Yep good call, that's definitely a controversial one! I included that one on my "highways to nowhere" video since the bridge was eventually cancelled before it was built but it coulda worked out for either video!

[@tennyho3236]

I think that is at least used by the military

[@josephveksenfeld5344]

It was proposed, but never built. Thanks to some disingenuous reporting the bridge became something of a joke: it's a bridge to an island where only 50 people live; it's going to cost $400 million; prime example of pork barrel politics, etc. However, just like $500 pliers and $25,000 "toilet seat" from the early 1980s people didn't get a full story. It definitely wasn't a "bridge to nowhere." It was supposed to connect the town of Ketchikan to its airport on Gravina Island. Passengers and airport staff have to use ferries to cross the Inland Passage to reach the airport. Ketchikan is the second busiest airport in southwest Alaska. When the sea is too rough for the ferries to run, the airport has to shut down, even though the planes would otherwise be able to take off and land. Because of the width of the Inland Passage the bridge would have been over 1.5 miles. The Passage is also a major route not just for cruise ships but also cargo, the bridge would have to be high enough for ocean-going ships to pass under it. The length and the height of the bridge it would be a major project to build. Add remote location and $400 million doesn't seem like a lot for a project of this magnitude. In the end, the bridge was never built, even though it is still badly needed. BTW, even though I am not a big fan of Sarah Palin, I think she is unfairly taking the blame for it. It was Sen. Ted Stevens and Rep. Don Young who inserted the earmark for the bridge in the Federal budget well before Palin became the Governor of Alaska. While she supported building the bridge (what governor would not support an infrastructure project of this magnitude in their state?) she was not the initial proponent of the project.

[@ryantraingamer5]

The king coal highway is planned to be i 73 and I 74

[@DJAYPAZ]

Is there a video that covers roads to nowhere.

[@BuildingTales]

Yep! Did one a couple weeks back and have another one in the works!

[@kazikian]

10:08 what is this beautiful bridge?

[@adanactnomew7085]

Looks like the Peljesac bridge in Croatia

[@scronx]

Russky bridge -- isn't that fun!

[@repurpbus]

I remember the I 280 / I 680 - US101 interchange in San Jose in the mid 1970's. They were sitting there for years. It is now named after a San Jose City Council member that had a car lifted up to the bridge in a stunt, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Colla_Interchange

[@BuildingTales]

Very cool, wasn't familiar with that one!