Bridges to Nowhere? Social Movements, Sufficiency, and the National Register of Historic Places

• In Event: 2483 - Section on Collective Behavior and Social Movements Refereed Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 04. Framing and Social Movement Outcomes

Abstract

Bridges not only form a critical piece of the national transportation infrastructure, they also represent historic and sentimental value for many in society. The historical significance of a bridge – due to age, design uniqueness, local importance, or a combination of these factors – may serve as an effective frame for a social movement to try and save or protect the structure. Social movement research generally treats physical systems as a means through which movements frame their objectives toward a larger social end. This research does not usually consider the potential for infrastructure and the built environment itself to serve as an end goal of the movement. This paper considers the impact of local social movements that seek to enroll bridges on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) and how such enrollments impact the closure rates and subsequent maintenance of such bridges. Using panel data derived from the National Bridge Inventory (NBI), preprocessed through the use of coarsened exact matching (CEM), and employing a Cox proportional hazards model, bridges enrolled on the NRHP have a 68% lower risk of closure in post-enrollment years as compared to similar non-enrolled bridges. Additional analysis shows that these movements target bridges of lower overall sufficiency and higher project costs than other similar bridges and those which continue in serving roadway traffic experience only marginal improvement in non-historic aspects. Thus, social movements may inhibit change by promoting historicity and limiting corrective engineering options.

Authors

• Jaison D. Desai, Carnegie Mellon University

• Daniel Erian Armanios, Carnegie Mellon University