Today I planned to post my first in-depth post about my trip to Italy, and I was really excited about it, but then something time sensitive occurred that I couldn’t postpone. Several people sent me links to this Facebook post and asked me what on earth was happening on my old drawbridge.
For those of you who don’t do Facebook, I’ll post The Other 98%’s post here in its entirety:
“Jacksonville activists just schooled Ron DeSantis in the art of rainbow resistance, flipping his red-white-and-blue bridge lighting mandate into a vibrant display of community power. When the governor’s "Freedom Summer" policy banned Pride colors on state bridges this June, locals arrived at the Main Street Bridge armed with flashlights and rainbow gels—only to find the span mysteriously raised without explanation as they approached. Undeterred, hundreds pivoted to the Acosta Bridge, where families and allies transformed the structure into a shimmering symbol of defiance using handheld lights.
“The bridge’s abrupt elevation—occurring with no boats in sight—fueled suspicions of state interference, but organizers called it a "beautiful metaphor" for DeSantis’ flailing attempts to erase LGBTQ+ visibility. "They can control the switches, but not our collective light," said activist Matthew McAllister, whose group had secured permits only to encounter the unexpected barrier. The seamless shift to the Acosta span saw participants chanting "We’re here, we’re queer" while illuminating the skyline, their phones broadcasting the spectacle nationwide.
“This grassroots light show underscores a growing trend of Floridians circumventing authoritarian policies through improvisation. While DeSantis’ administration claims the monochrome mandate promotes unity, critics note it coincidentally targets Pride Month and Juneteenth celebrations. As rainbow reflections danced on the St. Johns River, the message rang clear: no governor can extinguish a community’s right to shine.”
First of all, let me make one thing crystal clear. I think Ron De Santis is a disgusting excuse for a human being, and it stuns me that anyone thought it was a good idea to vote for that tiny fraction of a man. It is a fact, as this article explains, that last month he created a mandate that bridges could only be lighted in red, white and blue from Memorial Day through Labor Day. It’s no coincidence that that includes Pride Month and Juneteenth among other days that deserve illumination. He is an ignorant, lackluster man who wants to marginalize anyone who doesn’t see the world the way he does. I am constantly reminded by his many cruelties that leaving Florida was one of the best things I have ever done.
Now you’ll comprehend the level of disgust I feel to have to do something that goes against everything that I stand for: I’m about to defend Ron DeSantis. Ugh. Jesus take the wheel. This is not going to be pleasant for me to write, but I feel as though I have no choice, because in this instance, the best way for me to defend some decent people is to make a case for that despicable pig DeSantis, too.
The minute I read the Facebook post that I quoted above, I knew one thing for certain: The Main Street Bridge was not up in the air that night to foil the plans of the activists who wanted to light up that bridge. I know it in ways that most other people can’t know it. I know it because I’ve been on the inside.
I have been a bridgetender for almost 24 years. The first 13 of those years, I was a bridgetender in Jacksonville. For quite a bit of those 13 years, I worked at the Main Street Bridge. Before that, I worked for three years in the State of Florida, Department of Transportation as a Maintenance Management Systems Engineer in the nearby St. Augustine office. I know the ins and outs of FDOT, and of the bridges, and how they intersect. If I were sworn in before a judge and presented those as my bona fides, I think I’d be considered to be qualified to testify, wouldn’t you?
So let’s unpack this nefarious conspiracy. The article said that the bridge was “raised without explanation,” and that there were “no boats in sight.” Well, for a start, there are plenty of reasons for a bridge to open with no boats in sight. The most common one is that they’re doing some maintenance on the bridge. If it’s planned maintenance, they often choose to do it at night, when traffic is lightest.
It could also be that the bridge has malfunctioned. But if that’s the case, and it’s up in the air that long, you’d be hearing about it all over the place in real time, so let’s eliminate that possibility. If they were doing a test opening to make sure they’d fixed a problem, or if they were training a new bridgetender, it would have gone up, then immediately down, so I am guessing those options could be eliminated, too. So my guess is maintenance.
And in terms of being raised without explanation, if it was maintenance, and it was up in the air for that long of a period, then there’s always an explanation somewhere. And in fact, northeastfloridatraffic.com posted on May 28th that the bridge would be closed for 5 evenings for maintenance. They closed from 9 pm to 5 am on the Wednesday and Thursday before the illumination event, did not close that Friday and Saturday, and then closed again that Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. (Sunday was the day of the illumination.) (I took a screenshot of that post, since the event has expired and the posting might disappear.)
That scans for me. Those are the hours they usually do major maintenance. And when they do so, they usually try to avoid Fridays and Saturdays, because people tend to stay out later on those nights.
Main Street Bridge is 83 years old. It’s a long, heavily-traveled span over a deep river with a strong current that shifts direction daily. When I left, some of its parts were still original. If you knew half of what I know about the state of that bridge, unless they’ve done a major overhaul since 2014, you might be hesitant to cross the thing. So, in my opinion, major maintenance is long overdue.
Another thing I know is that, of the 3 departments of transportation I’ve worked with, they are as easy to shift as the Titanic. They plan things like major maintenance months, if not years, in advance. They have to figure out the funding. They have to put the contract out for bid. They have to prove that there was no corruption when choosing the contract, because the losers always protest. They have to fabricate the parts for these old bridges, because you can’t exactly buy them at Wal-Mart. They have to have the proper machinery, in working order, in the right place, at the right time.
Getting all that together by deadline is a major miracle. Now, imagine this: you throw an iceberg in their path, such as, “Oh, by the way, can you postpone your maintenance one day, because a group wants to illuminate the bridge on Sunday?” Trust me, do that, and the ship is going down. Their out-of-town contractor is not going to pay for their out-of-town crew to stay in a hotel an extra day. If any equipment had to be rented, there’s no guarantee that it isn’t already supposed to be elsewhere a day later. The weather forecast might not cooperate. There are just too many moving parts.
Another statement in the article was, “they can control the switches…” Well, if by “they” you are referring to DeSantis, you couldn’t be more wrong. Yes, the homophobic governor of Florida might be able to play with the lightbulbs, but he has zero authority to mess with a drawbridge’s opening schedule.
There’s actually a Federal Regulation for that. It’s called 33 CFR 117.35. It states that only the District Commander of the Coast Guard can issue a deviation approval letter to change the operating schedule of a drawbridge, unless a natural disaster or civil disorder has been declared. And believe me, those approval letters take months to obtain, too. (In Seattle, we start working on our 4th of July deviation request every February, and that’s an annual thing, so you wouldn’t think it would be that hard.) They require a mound of documentation, and that documentation requires advance planning and constitutes publicly attainable evidence. Based on all that, I guarantee you that if DeSantis, or even Trump for that matter, got on the phone and said, “put Main Street Bridge in the air right now,” he’d be laughed at and hung up on.
The only time in recorded history that the opening of a drawbridge has been used in a political way was when the drawbridges got raised in Chicago during recent riots, and frankly, it made me sick. Basically, it was like protecting one neighborhood from another. It’s awfully racist to confine the chaos to the poor neighborhoods, and make it so those people can’t escape it. Very bad optics.
I’m willing to bet that the only reason the Coast Guard didn’t get worked up about those Chicago shenanigans is that those bridges only open up a few times a year anyway, so opening up more is a bonus. Also, the roads aren’t federal highways, so… what are you gonna do, you know? Still, it was shocking, outrageous, and very, very talked about, as seen here and here. Pulling a caper like that is a huge deal.
The post I quoted above also stated that they had secured permits. Well, I’m guessing those permits were with the City of Jacksonville. I doubt very much that the City of Jacksonville said a word to the State of Florida DOT, and even if they did, I doubt FDOT bothered to pass the info down to the subcontractors doing the maintenance or the subcontractors that are the bridgetenders. Believe me when I tell you that governmental communication, in every form, everywhere, is a joke. And I have heard that a lot of people were taken by surprise by this particular situation. That would not surprise me in the least. It’s typical.
I remember one time, sitting up on that bridge, and suddenly hearing a massive explosion on our catwalk. There were to be fireworks that night, including some that would be launched from the bridge. Nobody told us that. And while setting up, they accidentally set one off. If one of us had been standing outside, we would have been badly hurt. (I’ve never been so happy to not be a smoker in my life.) Another time, six camouflaged men with heavy assault rifles walked into our tenderhouse unannounced. It turned out that a presidential candidate was going to have a rally at the landing on the riverbank nearby, and they were there to protect said candidate. Again, nobody told us. That, that is the quality of communication we were treated to. It was like our administration tumbled out of a clown car when it came to work each day.
But then you have this article, quoting the same mentioned activist, which states they did not get a permit because one was not required, and that the complaint was about the initial bridge lift to get the workmen in place, not the 9pm all night maintenance lift, so it sounds like the miscommunication came not only from both sides, but from the media as well. What a mess.
But the main reason I was prompted to write this is that I’m reading some snarky comments on social media about the bridgetenders online, and it really bugs me. Unless things have changed drastically, those bridgetenders are not allowed to talk to the media, so they can’t even defend themselves. They’re being attacked for something that didn’t even happen, and that’s not fair.
I’ve been gone so long, I doubt I know anyone who works there personally anymore, but when I was there, even though the pay was so low that FDOT should be ashamed of themselves, even though they got no benefits to speak of and were treated like pure shit by their employers and by FDOT, and even though they were in an anti-union, right-to-work state and could never be sure that they would have their job from one day to the next, 99 percent of them took great pride in being a bridgetender, and it bothered them more than a little when people thought they weren’t doing a good job.
Every bridgetender has his or her own politics. I suspect that as in times past, those politics are reflective of the Jacksonville population as a whole. I’m sure some are very tolerant and others are not. But none of them would want to be accused of participating in preventing that illumination, whether they agreed with it or not. It is not what they are there for.
I also know that given the overall fear of job loss, they certainly wouldn’t have acted on their own. So please, please don’t blame the bridgetenders. And in terms of the bridge being up in the air, don’t blame DeSantis, either. It was up for good reason.
Blame DeSantis for being a homophobic ignoramus. Vote for anyone but him next time around. But for once in his pathetic political life, I have to say, with a tiny bit of vomit in my mouth, he’s innocent this time, everyone.
Next time you believe a conspiracy, consider this: if you think that particular bureaucracy is incompetent on a good day (as most of them are), then why do you think they’d be competent enough to successfully pull off a conspiracy? Isn’t that kind of like expecting a baboon to do calculus? Why do you think they can all of a sudden keep massive secrets when they can’t even pat their heads and rub their bellies at the same time?
I mean, maybe I’m too cynical, but I think the average politician is too stupid to manage anything that complex. If they could, they’d have aimed higher than political office. These guys think islands float and snowballs mean that global warming doesn’t exist. If you want to conspire to have a child sex trafficking ring, do you take a job that puts you in the public eye? The logistics alone would be too much for them. Anyway…
To end on a lighter note, I wish I could have seen the illumination of the Acosta. It looks like it was absolutely gorgeous. I can’t imagine it happening in Jacksonville 20 years ago. Maybe the city I spent 30 years desperately trying to leave is taking baby steps forward after all, despite being in Florida. If so, well done! And happy pride!
Ugh. Now I need to go wash the DeSantis residue off my soul…
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