In case you are living under a rock and unaware, a portion of I-95 collapsed at Cottman Avenue on Sunday morning. Governor Josh Shapiro said this about the timeline for repairs, via Tom Ignudo at CBS News:

A portion of Interstate 95 in Philadelphia collapsed after a commercial truck carrying a petroleum-based product caught fire early Sunday early morning. 

So how long will it take to rebuild one of the biggest highways that thousands upon thousands of residents drive on every day? 

“With regards to the complete rebuild of I-95 roadway, we expect it to take some number of months,” Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said. “We expect it to take that time and we will have that specific time set forth once the engineers and PennDOT have completed their review.”

Now, my initial thought was that this would take 10 years minimum. That was assuming PennDOT was running the show. PennDOT is utterly useless, one of the worst government agencies in the history of humankind (unless you love red tape and governmental bureaucracy). Every “work” day until 2033 would be spent putting up cones in the morning, taking down the same cones in the afternoon, and then the other three hours would consist of 10 guys standing around to watch one guy use a jackhammer while a “foreman” sits in his Ford F-350 Super Duty, talking on his phone.

However, the federal government is going to get involved with this, which means fortune has found us. Huzzah!

Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, known for his wealth of experience and knowledge in the field, said this Sunday evening:

Armed with this knowledge, we are setting the over/under for repairs at 3.5 months. Get your bets in now at the Crossing Broad sports book. Right now people are HAMMERING the over, so will you ride the public wave or fade the sardonic bloggers?


While it’s true that the average construction job in this area takes 15 years or more to complete (not actually joking), this will hopefully be different. The feds get involved, they prioritize this, and the pencil pushers make a few phone calls to get things moving. Fingers crossed.

Truth be told, however, if this was the Netherlands, those mofos would have this thing rebuilt in a weekend. They’d send every engineer and every work crew from Amsterdam to Alkmaar. They’d drop everything, waive all of the nonsensical stuff standing in the way, and get things moving in no time.

Shit, call the Japanese too: