Posted on 03/24/2011 2:08:11 PM PDT by James C. Bennett
Japan's world-class transportation infrastructure couldn't withstand this month's 9.0-magnitutde quake, but their construction teams are still amazing. This stretch of highway was repaired in just six days by a Herculean road crew. This is the triumph of Japanese engineering. The March 11th quake and tsunami crushed roads, destroyed bridges, twisted trains tracks, and otherwise did to Japan what your little brother did to your ideal Sim City creation when you weren't looking.
A stretch of the Great Kanto Highway in Naka, Japan looked like the huge crater above on March 11th. The shaking left a 150-meter crack along the main section of the road. Given the massive and widespread damage the workers, many of whom returned to work the next day, likely didn't have long to appreciate their work before moving on to the next piece of cratered earth.
Crews from highway repair company NEXCO arrived to start repairing the damaged highway on March 17th. By the end of the day on March 23rd the road was opened to traffic.
Just remember this the next time you hit Lake Shore Drive and notice the same pothole that's been there for eight months.
And don’t forget everybody to send the article to all your fat union friends.
Look at the road sign on the left and its relationship to the powerline in the background. Look at the bare trees on the left. Look at the cedar at the base of the powerline standard. They are taken at the same spot.
Several years ago a Freeper here relayed information I'd never heard before. I can't say if it was true. Yes, there are unions. Yes, they go on strike, but they do not walk out. They wear arm bands to show they are on strike, but they continue to work. They know not working harms the company, and the bottom line, and they also know harming the company would ultimately result in lay-offs, which would harm them or those they work with.
Dig a whole and fill it with dirt and pave the surface in 6 days. Big freaking deal. The Japanese are capable of so much more than that. This is kid's stuff for them AND for the USA. Excavate and backill a hole in 6 days. Pffffffffffffffft.
That had to replace 2 spans on BOTH the upper and lower decks. And yes, they did it with Union labor. I don’t love unions, but I am not so blind I can’t give credit where credit is due. It is the idiotic environmental laws and government bureaucracy and idiotic POLITICIANS who slow projects down, not Union labor. I’ve worked along side these guys and in general, they work there asses off or they don’t get a call-back from union hall. Not all of them of course, but most of them work like dogs. You all couldn’t do what they do. You would be in tears within a week.
OK, I LOL’d.
We have a winner!
Looks to me like the “after” shot is actually some fifteen feet further back than the “before” shot. Look at the hedge and trees on the left side of the picture.
This feat was achieved by one of the three NEXCO companies formed six years ago when JH (a public utility company responsible for highway construction and maintenance) was privatized. And it is unionized...
Japanese Guilds are a bit like unions, but they are different.
What happens when an American manufacturing plant experiences downtime? I guess in most cases the workers either go home and get paid for doing nothing (union shop), or get told to go home and don’t get paid for doing nothing (right to work, non-unionized).
It’s completely different with the Japanese. They wouldn’t disgrace themselves by going home, union or no union.
I worked at a Japanese manufacturing plant in the 90s. When it had teething troubles with new systems in the clean room to the point where manufacturing had to stop for a week or so, everyone from the security gate staff to the senior management was encouraged to spruce the factory up, relay carpets, clean up the grounds, re-tarmac the car park, give the company cars a deep clean inside and out, rearrange the open-plan areas, and so on.
I spent a couple of hours replacing some 320 network cables in the data center with color-coded, tied versions and putting labels on them to make maintenance easier. I wasn’t told to, it was just something that needed doing.
There’s a photo somewhere of a senior manager in his sixties, painting the picket fences.
By the time it returned to business as usual, the entire building was in an immaculate condition, the cars all smelt factory-fresh, and best of all we could play golf on the newly landscaped ground around the factory building and take pride in the fact that “we all did this”.
Pride in your work is only part of the Japanese work ethic; pride in the workplace and pride in the company you work for are part and parcel of the package. And it’s a mutual respect thing.
The Euro 96 soccer tournament did result us northern Brits taking liberties with the lunch hour(s). We just told the boss and depending on who was playing who, he’d say “see you later”, “see you tomorrow”, or “I’ll get the beers in”.
You Japanese can’t do that!!! You’re embarrassing unions and diversity nations like Haiti by doing that!
Related question...looking at pics of the incredible devastation from the earthquake and then the tsunami, I wondering..just where do they put all the wreckage, the detritus. I mean..there is NO room..what do they do with all of it?
But, what about the environmental reports required before work could start?
What are they proposing to alleviate all the harm that this project created without necessary permits?
sarcasm/off
bkmk
The two entities are inseparable. If they're going to be a wholly owned subsidiary of the idiotic statist politicians who pass the idiotic laws and benefit mightily from these ridiculously drawn-out projects (at our expense, mind you), then they're going to be on the receiving end of some bad will from the taxpayer. That's just the way it goes.
Count the stripes in the road and the tower and sign - same exact view. However, I am concerned about the degradation of the wildlife habitat on the repaired slope, and will be forwarding this to the World Wildlife Fund, Sierra Club, their lawyers, and hope that some type of International EPA can look into this travesty.
Obviously no environmental reviews were performed, ground water audits, slope feasability issues or handicap access or bike lanes were addressed in this project.
AND WHERE THE HECK IS THE $10,000 “YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK” SIGN!!!???
I remember reading about the owner of the company back then, he was quite the bad-ass...
Here in Texas we have Zachry and Austin, who just take their sweet time ( union crap )...
I'd say the "after" shot is actually slightly closer. You see more of the hedge/trees in the "after" shot because the camera aimpoint is slightly different.
"Before" is centred on the slim highway sign.
"After" on the new white structure at the base of the two trees just to its left.
But near enough identical road section.
Non-union, I assume?
Since your that good on photos, why dont you do some work on BOs BC?
We could use someone who can sort through, that sort of thing.
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