Climate change could cause bridges to ‘fall apart like toys’, experts say

On a 95-degree day this summer, New York City's Third Avenue Bridge, which connects the Bronx and Manhattan, remained open for hours. As heat and flooding scorched and battered the Midwest, a steel railroad bridge connecting Iowa to South Dakota collapsed under rising water. In Lewiston, Maine, a bridge closed after its deck buckled due to fluctuating temperatures.

America's bridges, a quarter of which were built before 1960, were already in need of repair. But now extreme heat and increased flooding linked to climate change are accelerating the disintegration of the nation's bridges, engineers say, effectively aging them prematurely.

The ...