The massive rail bridges over 52d Street in West Philadelphia are a portrait of neglect.
Trees grow from their ramparts, water weeps through their stone walls, holes are visible in the rusting deck, the piers are cracked, beams are corroding. Trash gathers at the base of the columns.
Every day, scores of trains and thousands of passengers cross the bridges on five sets of tracks. Amtrak trains run there between Harrisburg and Philadelphia, and SEPTA's busiest route, the R5-Paoli line, passes over.
The 108-year-old structure is a key span on a route the Obama administration is considering for a high-speed rail corridor that could carry 125-m.p.h. trains.
But like many Amtrak bridges in the Philadelphia region, the 52d Street structure is made of corroded steel and crumbling stone.
Amtrak inspectors rate many of its structural elements "poor." Some components are even worse, marked "serious," just one grade above "failed."
Nearly half of Amtrak's 302 bridges in the Philadelphia region have some elements rated "poor" or worse, according to Amtrak's bridge-inspection reports, prepared over the last two years. The Inquirer obtained them under the Freedom of Information Act.
The inspections show that 143 bridges - 47.4 percent - received "poor" or lower marks for such defects as deteriorated metal plates or decaying stone walls. Some have eroded support piers, others badly worn girder elements and missing rivets. (The count does not include marks for painting or signs, which would push the number of "poor" structures even higher.) None of the bridges had any "failed" marks.
Amtrak officials say the bridges remain safe for travel. But decades of deferred maintenance mean the aging bridges will require hundreds of millions of dollars to bring them into good repair.
The situation is similar elsewhere in the country, where Amtrak owns about 1,400 bridges, largely in the Northeast. Lacking money to meet all of its repair and maintenance needs, Amtrak has deferred an estimated $5 billion in capital and infrastructure maintenance spending.
"In addition to increasing the risk of a major failure on the system, the deteriorated condition of Amtrak's rolling stock and infrastructure may contribute to higher operating costs and reduced reliability of service," the GAO said in a 2006 study, the last review of its kind by the agency.
Charles S. Yordy, Amtrak's director of structures, maintenance, and inspection, said the bridges, even in their present state of deterioration, remain safe for use.
"Our primary concern, first and foremost, is the safety of the traveling public," he said.
Accidents related to structural failure of rail bridges are relatively rare. Federal Railroad Administration records show that between 1982 and last year, 58 train accidents were caused by the structural failure of railroad bridges, all on freight railroads and none fatal.
In the Philadelphia region, many of Amtrak's bridges are more than 100 years old, inherited from the defunct Pennsylvania and Reading railroads. Built in the age of steam locomotives, the bridges were designed for heavier trains than they now carry.
"So we have some degree of reserve capacity," Yordy said. "You can have some reduction in material and not have a calamitous collapse." He said "rust looks a lot worse than it is."
Independent engineers, agreeing that poor ratings don't mean impending disaster, say the reports are warning signs of the need for prompt attention.
"Everything is of concern, but it's not necessarily earth-shaking," said Ben T. Yen, professor emeritus of civil engineering at Lehigh University and a consultant to companies and states on bridge evaluation and repair. "Every part of a bridge is important and needs to be maintained."
Decades of wear, rain, snow, road salt, and debris cause deterioration in bridge support structures.
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