The View from a Drawbridge

Tag: drawbridge

  • Bridgetender [sic]

    Recently someone quoted my WordPress blog tag line like so: “The random musings of a bridgetender [sic] with entirely too much time on her hands.” For the uninitiated, “sic” is basically latin for “Okay, I’m writing it this way because it’s a direct quote, dude, but it’s WRONG.” I wanted to scream when I saw…

  • The Domino Effect

    I had an interesting discussion about fate with a friend the other day. She sees it as sort of a fixed point, and no matter what you do, what choices you make, sooner or later you are going to wind up at that point, wherever it may be. That kind of depresses me. If that’s…

  • Wax On, Wax Off

    When I work on the new South Park Drawbridge here in Seattle, one of my duties is to wash the tower windows inside and out once a month. Given that the building looks similar to an air traffic control tower and has large windows all around its perimeter, this not a trifling endeavor. But needless…

  • It Came Without Ribbons

    ‘Twas an odd Christmas indeed for me this year in this land of total strangers. I didn’t deck the halls with boughs of holly. I didn’t string lights. I didn’t attend parties or wrap gifts. I left no cookies out for Santa as I knew that this year he’d pass on by. It’s hard to…

  • Exploring Seattle – Part 8

    The day I’m about to describe is one that I could have only had in Seattle. It’s one of the most charming things about this city. I’m coming to realize that it has a culture, a vibe, and an attitude all its own. I was casting about for something inexpensive to do, and was reading…

  • The Drawbridge Ghost

    Deep in the bowels of one of the many drawbridges of Seattle (I shall not say which one), lies a dungeon-like room that is dark, damp, and empty except for three folding chairs. I don’t know why the chairs are there, but I must confess that whenever I enter that room I get the feeling…

  • Throw Me a Bone

    I just finished training on the University Drawbridge. That’s two Seattle bridges under my belt. So if you count the three bridges I was qualified on in Jacksonville, Florida and the one in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, that’s 6 bridges I’ve operated, and that includes all three main types of bridge (bascule, lift, and swing).…

  • Drawbridge Tao

    People can take it very personally when you interrupt their morning commute. Even though the average drawbridge opening takes only 4 minutes from start to finish and they should know to allow for the fact that their route crosses a drawbridge, when those red lights start to flash and that bell starts to clang, people…

  • An Osprey Update

    Last year I wrote a few blog entries about a pair of ospreys that had built a nest on the traffic light of one of the drawbridges where I work. In the first entry, Battle of the Birds, I talked about how this couple would build their nest, and then the Department of Transportation would…

  • Drawbridge Style

    It has been my privilege to be one of the few bridgetenders on the planet to have had the opportunity to operate all three of the most common styles of drawbridges. So here is an extremely basic primer.   This is a bascule bridge. These come in the form of a double span, like the…