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Comment by kristofferR | Hacker News Reader

Probably the best image, showing the scale of the collapse: https://gfx.nrk.no/gJothoXlgJysV_sS10u_RQaXLsIZsJIlLIQrfEX8E...

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I know that's an international standards, and in general it's safe and nothing to worry about, but I hate the fact that we build houses under bridges or bridges above houses. Even probable things like a drunk throwing glass bottle to my garden from moving train scare shit out of me.

It's not a prime location, but beats not having enough housing.

What about the Netherlands, with 20% of the population living below sea level, waiting for the day the dike breaks?

We're not waiting, we're currently reinforcing the dikes so they'll be estimated to break only once every 100,000 years instead of every 10,000 years, while taking sea level rise into account.

There's that one dike in Wilnis though that threatens to break every time we have a severe drought, like this year...

I know, I've lived in NL most my life. Must remember Poe's law next time.

> threatens to break every time we have a severe drought

Interesting! Why would a dike be under greater threat in a drought when there is less water?

It dries out, loses volume and weight, then deforms and tears. There was a dike near Wilnis that actually broke in 2003, leading to half a metre of water in some streets there. Maybe the dike that was in the news a few weeks ago (it didn't quite break, but there was some danger) was a different one; I didn't check, but it was also near that village.

https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kadebreuk_Wilnis

Or someone taking a shit in a train with an old-style toilet...

People committing suicide in Seattle, jumping from the 99 bridge, led to at least one PTSD retirement from Adobe. People seemed not to want to land in the water, but on land, and the Adobe area was apparently an inviting target.

Some homeless guys smoking crack under an overpass ignited nearby material; the resulting fire led to the collapse of a stretch of I-85 in Atlanta last year.

Don't live under a bridge if you can help it. Given the state of disrepair of most American infrastructure it takes very little to bring them down.

And here is an image of what it looked like before: https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-genoa-liguria-polcevera-mo...

Another "before" image, from roughly the same perspective (from an article someone posted below).

http://cdn-media.ingegneri.info/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/C...

Looks 'spindly'

That green delivery truck (middle, left side) is really close to the edge of the collapsed section. What a nightmare for a driver of being so close to dying and seeing the entire thing happen (I assume).

There was at least one truck on the collapsed section where the driver survived (albeit with some injuries). Quoted as "I was normally driving, when the road just disappeared and everything started falling."

Why did they even build apartments under a bridge or a bridge over apartments? Can't think what would of have happened if the whole bridge collapses.

Same reason they build housing near other highly undesirable locations.

The housing is right next to an industrial trainyard from the looks of it. It was already undesirable before the bridge was built over it.

On the BBC the person they interviewed said that those apartments were abandoned however, so it may not be as bad as it looks.

Not just a trainyard: reportedly the bridge runs above Ansaldo Energia, a big company that makes generators and turbines. So yeah, definitely not prime land, but still crowded.

It's Genoa: sandwiched between sea and mountains, space is at a premium. Think of those lovely shots of Manarola and Cinque Terre, multiply them by a million, add one of Europe's biggest ports, and that's Genoa.

If you're building a tall apartment block you're already trusting your building regulations/safety practices to prevent disaster; having a bridge above you doesn't seem inherently more risky than having n floors of housing above you.

Because most of thr time bridges don’t collapse and it’s nice not to waste the space and create an unpleasant pedestrian dead zone below?

I wonder if they had insurance against the bridge falling?

The precollapse photos make me think that the bridge was built over an existing industrial area with minimal disruption to existing structures.

Looking at some of the links from the various Wikipedia articles on the subject, it does look like the buildings underneath the bridge predate the bridge: http://informesdelaconstruccion.revistas.csic.es/index.php/i...

In this case it is why they built a bridge over existing buildings.

A photo of the construction (1964):

https://www.autostrade.it/comunicazione-e-media/mediateca/ar...

By the same logic people should not live inside buildings other than cabins: if the building itself collapses the inhabitants don't survive.

The assumption is "falling bridges are a black swan event, there's hundreds of more likely corner cases to cover before you get there."

Usually, the bridge is new-ish (second half of 20th century or newer) and the buildings are 19th century or older. https://www.google.com/maps/@50.0651354,14.4307227,3a,75y,22...

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