Congratulations Charleston on Your New Bridge!!!!

[Rockholm]

It is beautiful! I will certainly miss that drive from Mount Pleasant into downtown on the old bridge. It was a real roller coaster. The last time I took the bridge was in 2001 on a visit. Boy, did my partner hate that bridge!

I grew up in Charleston and live in Boston now and it is great to see the city changing.

[Left_Winger]

1. It is a beautiful bridge

but it gives me a serious case of acrophobia. The old Cooper River bridge was indeed scary and my steering wheel has some serious imprints from gripping it as I drove over it. I can remember when it was the only bridge and had two-way traffic.

One of my oldest friends lives in Charleston and has a house on Sullivan's Island. Whenever we go out there I make him drive because I have to close my eyes and suppress my irrational phobias.

I wonder if there is a term for a "bridge-o-phobe"; only the really large and high bridges do this to me.

The bridge over the Delaware River from Wilmington to the NJ Turnpike causes the same fear in me. My sister lives in NYC, so I must take an alternative route whenever I drive up there to visit.

Hello from a fellow sandlapper. BTW, it's 97 here today. It was really sunny earlier, but a thunder-boomer is headed my way right now. How's the weather up yonder?

:hi:

[Rockholm]

2. The weather in Boston at 10:25pm is poor.

Temperature at 78. Humidity at 98%. Kinda like 8am in Charleston in August.

I was on www.charleston.net and took the 360 degree virtual tour of the bridge. Yikes. The Delaware Memorial Bridges are really scary too. I can't wait to take the new bridge in Charleston!

Happy Driving!

[LastDemocratInSC]

3. Arthur Ravenel was no match for Mendel Rivers

The Ravenel Bridge is nice. It's long, it's high, it spans the water. It's even picturesque. The problem is that the bridge is named for a still-living man who many fancy as the Holy City's most famous son. The fact is that Arthur Ravenel is a right-wing racist asshole who presided over the decline of Charleston's fortunes in Congress ... and didn't do a thing about it.

The bridge should have been named for the man who made Charleston what it once was. Lucius Mendel Rivers served 16 terms in Congress and secured the military bases that gave the Charleston its formidable economic strength and national military importance. Arthur Ravenel sat on his hands while base closure commissions chopped the area's economic legs off at the knees.

Wait, wait, don't tell me ... Oh! Rivers was a Democrat and Ravenel is a Republican? Maybe that explains it all.

To understand Ravenel, consider his comments upon the removal of the confederate flag from the State House dome: "Can you believe that there are those who think that the General Assembly of South Carolina is going to ... knuckle under, roll over and do the bidding of that organization known as the National Association for Retarded People?"

What a guy.

Nice bridge - bad judgment and taste in naming it. That defines the soul of Charleston more than anything else.

[Rockholm]

4. Mendel Rivers would have been a good choice.

Maybe even Septima Clark? Joe Riley (the ballpark has his name).
There were and are many Charlestonians who would have been better concensus choices.

[China_cat]

5. Septima Clark would have been a GREAT choice.

I had the privilege of meeting her about a year before she died and was greatly impressed by her quiet strength and iron will.

[China_cat]

6. btw, this bridge was finished a YEAR ahead of schedule.

I don't know about anybody else, but that really worries me.

[hiaasenrocks]

7. It's great!

I've been over the bridge just once so far, a week after it opened. I had no reason to go over it, and with the hype I figured I would stay clear of it until some of that died down. Once I went over it, I was amazed. You really can't appreciate it until you're on it.