Engineers offer report card on the nations infrastructure and suggestions to fix it

 Editor - During his election, and the early days of his Presidency, Barack Obama
underlined the need to repair and maintain the nation's infrastructure. While the unemployed are seeking work and financial woes continue,what's the status of that infrastructure and what plans can be made to fix it?

An enterprising organization called Bioengineering has done extensive work in organizing information on this problem, listing references and information that give detailed data on the present status of the nation's infrastructure that not only discusses the problems but
provides solutions as well.

The best synopsis of that infrastructure status is best summed up by the History Channel,
one of the many sources provided by Bioengineering:  "America’s infrastructure is  collapsing. Tens of thousands of bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. A third of the nation’s highways are in poor or mediocre shape. Massively leaking water and
sewage systems are creating health hazards and contaminating rivers and streams. Weakened and under-maintained levees and dams tower over communities and schools. And the power grid is increasingly maxed out,disrupting millions of lives and putting entire cities in the dark. "

This underlines the problems America faces at a time there are many people out of work.  Is it time to perhaps consider the Franklin D. Roosevelt strategy and return to those workfare programs of the 1930's Great Depression to match need in rebuilding with concerns for the
unemployed?   PBS examined this issue and considers this a direction to move.   It contents it makes sense, given what is happening today both in the economy and with the desperate concerns of cities that lack proper roads, bridges, levees and dams to protect populations from potential dangers, the kind that have been occurred with the bridge collapse in
Minnesota and the levee problems in Tennessee.

Bioengineering not only provides a listing of detailed studies, reports, television broadcasts, research and essays about the crumbling infrastructure but has also offered resources and suggestions on specifically what to do about these problems.  It also gives 50 items on a "Must-See Report Card" that spells out the details and where the need is most great.

On that list, for example, is an item entitled "Strengthening the Rural Economy - Strengthening the Rural Infrastructure."  And it isn't just bridges and roads that are part of that infrastructure as pointed out in a presentation by the Council of Economic Advisers.  This means federal support that helps with transportation, telecommunications, water
infrastructure and energy.  It means linking rural residents in social and economic ways so they can participate with others in the nation's progress.  These areas, as observed by engineering experts, are critical for economic survival of many rural communities.

So as the new Congress begins to take control this year the data provided by bioengineering remind everyone of the desperate need for rebuilding and restoring the infrastructure of the country that comes at a good time for the plans in putting folks back to work.

The extensive survey of reference materials, guides and plans from Bioengineering gives in a solid, organized list the information the government  needs to begin the task at hand so a new study doesn't need to be done and delays continue on what Bioengineering spells out as an urgent need.