Changing the face of Charleston : The unbuilding of the Grace and Pearman Bridges
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Unbuilding Highlights
(Apr 10)
Meeting St. Stories
(Jul 10 2006)
East Bay Stories
(Oct 10 2006)
Drum Island Stories
(Feb 17)
Pearman Bridge Stories
(Apr 3)
Grace Bridge Stories
(Apr 3)
Imposions: Prep and boom
(Mar 27)
Unbuilding Bridge Blog
(July 23 2006)
Unbuilding Challenges
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(Feb 20)
Unbuilding Stories
(Mar 13)
Video and Sounds
(Feb 28)

August 19, 2005: Unbuilding Coleman Blvd and recycling

This is what remains of the beginning of Coleman Blvd.

and the mixture of concrete and rebar is all for recycling

Here you can see the rebar that has been separated from the concrete. Bill Callanan has provided a great description of the separation process:

The concrete is removed from the rebar using concrete pulverizers and 
"Universal Processing" attachments. These tools pulverize the concrete and it 
falls from the steel. Then the steel can be down sized using a shear 
attachment on the excavator or down sized at the scrap yard. Either way the 
down sizing of the steel prepares it for a smelter to be melted down. 
By removing the concrete from the steel it can be recycled rather than 
disposed of at a land fill. The concrete can be recycled as well once the 
steel has been reused.

Looking up the Pearman and Grace on-ramps from Coleman Blvd.

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Attribution: C. Frank Starmer and Sparky Witte from http://oldcooperriverbridge.org