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Investigators can be seen walking the site of the bridge collapse that crosses Fern Creek in Frick Park, a city park in Pittsburgh on Saturday. The bridge collapsed on Friday morning the same day as President Biden’s visit to Pittsburgh. Photo by Archie Carpenter/UPI | License Photo
Jan. 29 (UPI) — Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf has signed a disaster emergency proclamation for Allegheny County after the collapse of the Fern Hollow Bridge in Pittsburgh.
Wolf’s announcement came as the National Transportation Safety Board said Saturday that it had a team at the site to investigate the collapse.
The federal agency also released video footage from their investigation of the collapse, including stunning drone footage providing aerial views of the bridge on Forbes Avenue, which spanned Frick Park in Pittsburgh’s Point Breeze neighborhood.
Wolf said in a statement Friday that the disaster emergency proclamation “ensures a quick response for reconstruction” of the bridge, which is part of a major commuter route.
“With the Fern Hollow Bridge seeing more than 14,000 cars daily, it’s critical that we act quickly to reconstruct it so that commerce can continue and life is not interrupted,” Wolf said. “This declaration allows us to support the county in getting to work quickly, making funding available, and reducing red tape or other barriers to completion.”
The disaster emergency proclamation authorizes state agencies to use all available resources and personnel to address the bridge collapse and removes bureaucratic red tape such as bidding and contract procedures on the reconstruction of the bridge.
President Joe Biden visited the site Friday and said it’s “simply unacceptable” that the nation’s infrastructure has gotten to such a state of disrepair that a bridge collapsed earlier in the day.
He made the remarks during a visit to the City of Bridges that happened to coincide with the collapse of one that injured 10 people.
