[MAGZine]

I don't think you're making the point you think you're making.

You should absolutely understand what the purpose of the bridge is, what sort of things will be transported across it (trains? pipelines? weights? hazardous materials?), what sort of volume it will handle, what are the goals you're looking to solve with the bridge, what are acceptable and unacceptable tradeoffs? where are OK connection points, and where won't work (and how does it tie into the broader regional/municipal transit story)? I could go on...

you give most software engineers a bridge building problem and they'll build the bay bridge when all they needed was a simple suspension bridge for foot traffic.

[vlovich123]

> you give most software engineers a bridge building problem and they'll build the bay bridge when all they needed was a simple suspension bridge for foot traffic.

Care to give me an example in the physical world a case where overnight that foot bridge overnight suddenly becomes a highway off-ramp? Oh and suddenly we’ve realized that our highway motorists all need a place to park within walking distance of the hotel right nearby that we built last night? Also, there’s going to be spies looking for weaknesses in your bridge, robbers and invading armies looking to loot and pillage on a daily basis.

[jacknews]

I don't think you read what I wrote.

Of course engineers need to understand all the requirements for the bridge.

But coming up with those requirements, ie designing the economic/business case, is a separate discipline. As someone said, some of that may also be engineering; economic engineering, traffic engineering, social, political etc, but it is not bridge engineering.