A section of a highway in Guangdong collapsed, and many vehicles plunged into the abyss in the middle of the night, resulting in 36 deaths so far.
Caixin reported that a family of five is missing, and it is unknown whether they are among the 36.
This highway has been in operation for less than 10 years, and the operator is involved in multiple contract disputes.
This, of course, does not necessarily mean that the operator is at fault. Some netizens question the quality of the project, while others question the maintenance, which needs further investigation.
However, in the past one or two years, there have been multiple accidents related to “engineering”, such as stadium collapses, natural gas pipeline explosions, and bridge collapses.
This is the “new risk” that ordinary people have to face. Twenty years ago, newspapers often reported disasters as coal mine accidents, which can be understood as the representative of “traditional risks”: as long as you are not mining coal, you are safe.
The new risks are unpredictable and uncontrollable for individuals, and everything depends on probability.
However, many accidents related to engineering actually raise an important question: the maintenance after large-scale infrastructure construction is crucial to the safety of a society.
In fact, “maintenance” is the most important part of urbanization.
In Manhattan, I see New York, and many houses are hundreds of years old. The Hamilton Hall occupied by Columbia University students spent tens of millions of dollars on maintenance and renovation in recent years.
The formation of a city is an art of time. It is easy to demolish and rebuild, but only by withstanding the test of time can it integrate with humanity.
China’s cities and roads are still young. However, all signs indicate that we have entered the “maintenance era”.
Work related to maintenance does not have social visibility and is also difficult to form “achievements”. It requires new social norms, not only laws and a sense of responsibility, but even calls for a new culture.
Sometimes when I run in Central Park, I am amazed at how it “grew up”. It first opened to the public in 1858, during the reign of Emperor Xianfeng of the Qing Dynasty.
This is a relay of generations, eventually forming a strong tradition, which is the power of culture, and it is very powerful.
Unfortunately, we also lack the most basic money and sense of responsibility. This is the biggest risk we face.
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