Podcast: The Infrastructure Show

The Soo locks bridge a 21 foot elevation difference between Lake Superior and Lake Huron and the rest of the Great Lakes in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. These locks are an essential link in the U.S. steel supply chain. At the end of 2018, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Detroit District, which operates and maintains Soo Locks, advanced the plan to add capacity and redundancy to the Locks by releasing a study analyzing the economic value of investing nearly $1 billion dollars in a new lock. In this podcast we learn about the locks and the findings of this evaluation study from Lt. Col. Greg Turner, Commander of the Detroit District for the Corps

The earthquake risk in California is real, and tall buildings present a particular hazard because they concentrate people and activities, they support critical economic activities, and their scale can pose threats to nearby people and structures. In December of 2018, San Francisco’s Department of Emergency Management released a study of tall buildings focused on damage minimization and quick restoration of functionality. In this podcast we learn about the recommendations in this study from Brian Strong, San Francisco’s Chief Resilience Officer and Director of its Office of Resilience and Capital Planning, the office that oversaw this study

Hundreds of large power plants and a nationwide, interconnected distribution network produce and deliver electricity to homes and businesses in the United States. While our electric system is quite reliable (though nowhere near the best compared across nations), cascading failures do shut down parts of the network, and natural disasters, such as hurricanes, snow storms, and earthquakes, can cause widespread power blackouts. Microgrids, partly- or fully-independent sources of localized electrical power, can add resilience and sustainability to the power system. To learn about the characteristics, applications, and motivations for microgrids, we talk with Dr. Chris Marnay, retired staff scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, who is an expert on microgrids and sustainable energy systems.

Damaging wildfires in the western U.S. are a growing threat. In California, wildfires destroyed tens of thousands of homes and caused the deaths of nearly 100 people in 2018. Fire also threatens public infrastructure, particularly the highway network, which is essential for both evacuation and the delivery of emergency response resources. To understand how wildfires have affected the state highway system, we talk with Rene Garcia, who is Chief of the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) Office of Emergency Management and Infrastructure Protection

Historically, cities grew up near water – rivers, lakes, the oceans – because of the easy mobility it provides. But water presents a barrier as well as an opportunity, motivating the organized use of ships for local transportation. No city in the United States relies more on ferry transportation for commuting, commerce, and recreation than Seattle, Washington. To learn more about the role of the region’s ferries as a part of its transportation infrastructure, we talk with Elizabeth Kosa, Chief of Staff – Ferries, at the Washington Department of Transportation.

Both policy makers and investors are supporting the increased use of private funds to finance new and renewed public infrastructure. This sounds like a good idea, but is it realistic? How do these public private partnerships, called P3s, work? What are their advantages and risks? To teach us more about P3s, we talk with David Pennington, managing director at BMO Capital Markets, who guides both public agencies and private investors on the path to P3s for infrastructure.

An important function of public transit is providing mobility for people with disabilities. This is particularly challenging because of the broad variety of needs and the complexity of providing appropriate facilities and services as a part of, or separate from, mainstream transit operations. Metro, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, serves the Washington, DC metropolitan area with rail transit, buses, and paratransit vehicles. Metro is a leader among U.S. cities in providing accessible transportation. To learn more about how Metro works to meet the needs of the disabled, we talk with David Shaffer, Metro’s Accessibility Policy Officer

The Delaware Department of Transportation (DelDOT) was among the winners of the 2017 Federal Highway Administration biennial National Roadway Safety Award in the category of Infrastructure and Operational Improvements. DelDOT’s winner was systematic deployment of a high-friction surface treatment that substantially reduced road departure crashes, especially in wet weather. In this podcast we learn about this surface treatment and DelDOT’s overall highway safety plan from the agency’s Chief Traffic Engineer, Mark Luszcz

Wind has been an important, renewable source of energy for millennia. In recent decades wind power has come into its own, now producing more than 6 percent of U.S. electricity and growing rapidly. Today tens of thousands of wind turbines, many taller than 50-story buildings, dot rural landscapes, and soon will appear off our coasts. The design and construction of large-scale wind farms is a challenge involving energy planning, economics, and engineering. To learn about the development and implementation of the wind energy resource in the Midwest, and the construction and operation of wind turbines, we talk with Spencer Moore, Vice President of Generation of MidAmerican Energy Company, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Energy, located in Des Moines, Iowa

Noise is an almost unavoidable result of the operation of transportation and other infrastructure systems. Trains, planes, and automobiles produce noise that can be a warning but is mainly a source of annoyance and sometimes health risk to neighbors, riders, and employees. Measurement and management of transportation noise are complex tasks requiring an understanding of physics, technology, human perception, and economics. To introduce us to some of the problems, methods, and interventions for addressing transportation noise we talk with Dr. Hugh Saurenman, president of ATS consulting, which conducts acoustic evaluations and develops mitigation strategies for transportation facilities.