Cary Clack: Hays Street Bridge remains a grand ol' dame
The old lady likes to have visitors on Sunday. Oh, she likes them every day, you understand.
When you had none for nearly 30 years except for those who worked to save and breathe new life into you and when you were neglected for years before that, you welcome anyone who thinks enough of you to visit any day they choose.
But it's the unrushed rhythms of Sunday afternoon, when her visitors can take their time with her, that this Louisiana-born super-centenarian who's made San Antonio her home most of her life, especially likes. Midafternoon, on Sunday, a family of six stopped by and brought their camera because the old lady loves being photographed, more so now, since her nips and tucks.
The Hays Street Bridge, the Grand Dame of medal truss bridges in San Antonio, has connected the East Side with downtown since her move here. It was built in 1881 across the Atchafalaya River near Morgan City, La.
Between 1908 and 1910, the bridge, which is a 225-foot Whipple truss bridge linked with a 130-foot Pratt truss bridge, was moved to San Antonio where, until the Nolan Street underpass was built, it was the only way to get around traffic stalled by trains barreling down the Union Pacific tracks.
For those of us who crossed the bridge with some frequency as children, there came a time when driving over it, with its rotting and rickety wooden deck with holes in it, was more thrilling and dangerous than the roller coaster at Playland Park. (When you were little, the roller coaster at Playland Park was a big deal once you got too big for the one at Kiddie Park.)
The bridge had become so dilapidated that by 1982 it was closed, and only the valiant efforts of neighborhood activists such as Nettie Hinton, conservationists and structural engineer Doug Steadman prevented it from being dismantled. It was declared a historic landmark, almost $4 million was used to refurbish it, and in July of last year, it reopened as a pedestrian and bicycling route.
She's still a rusty dame but with a new wood deck, the accessories of lights and concrete approaches that stretches it from Austin Street to just shy of Mesquite. She looks good. Her makeover has been enhanced by public art, thanks to the steel "silhouettes" of trains by artist Riley Robinson on the railings.
Sunday on the bridge, I passed the family of six. A teenage boy, lagging behind, said something to me that sounded like "Joker."
"What was that?" I asked.
Repair Rust Holes - News
Hays Street Bridge will be closing down on July 11 to repair sections of the wooden deck after the planks have been warped due to humidity and heat. Tuesday, July 5, 2011. OMAR PEREZ/operez@express-news.net The old lady likes to have visitors on Sunday
He brought the car home and began fixing it up over the summer. His father helped with some money for a basic paintjob. "It was your typical slap some 'mud' on the body to fill in the rust holes and then a simple spray job, but it didn't look half bad.
They need to be copper or another rust-proof material. Now we're forced to use nails that will rust and need to be replaced in a year or two. The fiberglass is poor quality also, like what people use to fix leaks in their homes.
Duct tape was used to cover most of the rust holes and then I hand-brushed the gooey green mixture onto it from the bottom up. That way if I ran out of paint the worst of the lower body rust would be covered. I didn't have enough for the roof so I
Eldridge provided the board with photos of the equipment, from the swing chains being too long to what appeared to be bullet holes in the slide. "There's a lot of rust and jagged edges," she said. "It's dangerous." A first ordinance on the 2011-2012
How to repair rust problems on your car and fix rust holes with ...
By now you should of noticed some of the rust is subsided or gone with the rust solution, now’s the part where we start to make some progress! :).
The first part is really simple, what you need to do is grab some of that aluminium mesh you’ve bought and measure that against the hole, be careful not to crease it! It’s damn near impossible to un-crease, it’s like a thicker version of aluminium foil.
Cut that out, and then using a neat little trick it’s very easy to put between the holes, observe:
Just cut a couple of holes in the middle-carefully, so you can pop the string through. This is how we fix the hole.
I forgot to buy it at the time but you can get a special aluminium adhesive which is probably more practical, but I had some very strong araldite, which I put round the edges. I then poked it through the hole and pulled it flat with the strings. I held it there for about 3 minutes I used a stop watch to time it and made sure it stayed flat, and then left it over night. So I knew it set thoroughly.
The next morning I gave it a good push and pull to make sure it was solid and, happy days it was!. Were now ready to start on the fibreglass, it’s not as easy as you initially think.. I thought I could cover both the holes on my car with one relatively large piece, but this stuff is very brittle when it’s wet, and it dries far too quickly, I was also worried about it being to thick and standing out on the body work, but I wouldn’t worry about that either.
The one thing you do have to keep in mind is that the resin you mix up dries very quickly and very hard so only mix as much as your going to need at any one time and no more, it’s too easy to waste it.
So first things first, similar to cutting the aluminium mesh to cover the hole, cut the fibreglass to an appropriate size so that it’s completely covering the hole with some space left over.
What you have to do then is mix the fibreglass resin and hardener, always keep in mind you only need the smallest amount of hardener to mix with the resin, this then “activates” it.
To make sure the fibreglass doesn’t move around or you don’t have to hold it while applying the resin, I roughly taped it into place. The resin you mix acts very quickly so I could remove the tape shortly after I’d put some resin on the fibreglass and then I could work over the rest of it from there.
The secret to doing this well is start in the middle and work to the outside, this way you avoid any air bubbles and it holds it firmly in place as you paint on more of the resin. Once you’ve covered the fibre glass completely and it’s stuck down really thoroughly, you just need to keep dabbing it to make sure it stays flat to the contours of the bodywork. This stuff sets pretty quickly, and is very tacky by the time you’ve covered it completely.
Repair Rust Holes - Bookshelf
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