I do not have a car. I have never had one and I in no way endorse this mode of individual transport as it has been conceived for a century. On the other hand, I am able to reflect on the catastrophe that the collapse of the Pierre-Laporte bridge would be for a society that has bet on everything by car.
It is obvious that, if the bridge were to collapse, there would not be too many possibilities to cross the river efficiently between the two banks. Yes, of course, there is the two-lane Quebec Bridge. But when you know that at rush hour, in Quebec, traffic is bumper to bumper, from Petit Champlain to the bridges, I don’t see how it would be possible to get all this one shore to the other. We must not forget either that the old bridge in Quebec — made of iron — is more than a hundred years old and that it too has suffered from great neglect for decades. One has only to remember what were its erection and the adventures of the assembly of the structure. I’m not sure he could withstand too much traffic for very long either. Disaster scenarios are possible, as several bridges have already collapsed around the world.
We could also talk about the deaths that such a disaster would cause, but that seems to escape the people concerned. One can imagine that, if the cables that hold the deck of the bridge were to give way, it would risk being precisely at a rush hour when the bridge is full… to bursting.
One could also think of the fact that the St. Lawrence Seaway would be blocked for quite some time, preventing river traffic and international trade, not to mention damage to the river.
In Quebec, you don’t build such a structure by snapping your fingers, at least not like the Chinese, who can build a 1,000-bed hospital in ten days. It seems that the disastrous costs of such a scenario have not been calculated. It would be necessary both to quickly build a “third” makeshift link and to take care of removing the corpses, the rolling stock and the entire collapsed structure from the river.
It was recently alleged that the Minister of Transport was not even made aware of a crucial report on the dangers that are on the horizon for the Pierre-Laporte bridge. Maybe it is. We must therefore ask ourselves how the other mandates of this department are managed. Undoubtedly, there are serious problems of competence and hierarchy in the offices of this ministry. On the other hand, neither the minister nor the Prime Minister are reliable when it comes to the security of this infrastructure, and they could stop playing grandstanding.