[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 15882]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                  REOPENING OF PFEIFFER CANYON BRIDGE

  (Mr. PANETTA asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PANETTA. Madam Speaker, I am proud to rise today to recognize the 
reopening of the Pfeiffer Canyon Bridge in Big Sur, California.
  After 4 years of drought, my district on the central coast of 
California finally got the rain it needed, but a little too much. As a 
result, this year there were many large-scale landslides, including 
this one, as we see here to my right, which knocked out the pilings of 
the Pfeiffer Canyon Bridge, causing this bridge to fail.
  This left a community of people isolated and numerous businesses 
without revenue for at least 8 months. But over that same amount of 
time, the people of Big Sur, the people and government of Monterey 
County, the engineers and construction crews, and the California 
Department of Transportation demonstrated a lot of grit, guts, 
determination, and dedication. They listened to each other and came 
together to fix this bridge.
  Tomorrow I will be able to attend the opening of this bridge. We will 
be able to show our pride for the record pace of construction, of 
government working together to get things done, the businesses that 
struggled but remained open in Big Sur during this time, and, most 
importantly, we will show our pride in the people of Big Sur and the 
communities on the central coast of California.

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