Engineering Group Gives Low Marks to Pennsylvania Infrastructure
By John Ostapkovich
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- A civil engineers' group has graded Pennsylvania's infrastructure, and it looks like summer school will be neccesary.
The 2014 report card from the Philadelphia section of the American Society of Civil Engineers gives the state no As. The highest of the sixteen grades was a "B" for freight rail.
There are no Fs, but report card leader Ann Tomalavadge (at lectern in photo) indicates she wouldn't want to bring these marks home.
"Of the seven infrastructure catagories getting D grades, all of them deal with transportation and water systems," she said. "Repairs and long-term funding are being shortchanged."
And we can pay now to fix things, she points out, or we can pay way, way more later.
A Septa official says that one Regional Rail line has seven bridges needing repair. The cost is now $10.3 million, but wait ten years and it's $166 million.
Parks and the handling of hazardous waste also got B- grades from the civil engineers.
You can see the full report at pareportcard.org.