DeSaulnier said he voted to approve the bridge's design in the 1990s when he was a Contra Costa County supervisor, but he never thought the span would take as long and be as expensive as it turned out to be.
"I don't know if I'd vote for this design again if I had the benefit of hindsight," DeSaulnier said.
The new bridge was designed to replace the existing eastern portion, part of which collapsed during the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. After years of delays and cost overruns, the bridge has become the largest public works project in state history, the committee said.
But officials overseeing the repairs and tests on hundreds of existing bolts said, once it's open, it will be a much safer option than the current bridge being used daily by commuters.
"It has taken too long. But I do believe when we talk about the safety of the new bridge, we have to keep the safety of the old bridge in mind, Steve Heminger, executive director of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, said. "It is a comparison. Which one is safer? We need to get people on the safer one as soon as possible."
Bridge officials say testing of the broken rods with others manufactured in a different batch in 2010 indicate the rods in question broke because of a bad batch of steel that at some point was infected by hydrogen, which made it brittle and prone to breaking. The rods that failed were made in 2008.
Further testing of the 2010 rods is needed before officials can determine if they need to be replaced immediately or just monitored after the bridge is opened to traffic.
If immediate replacement is needed, the bridge's scheduled Labor Day opening would likely be delayed.
Officials are trying to restore public confidence in the bridge's safety, and they applauded the Federal Highway Administration's decision to conduct an independent review of Caltrans' work identifying the cause of the broken rods and the agency's chosen repair.
If crews can verify the safety of the remaining rods and complete the $20 million repair to the broken ones, officials said there would still be a chance for a Labor Day opening.
However, no one involved in the bridge's construction feels that a celebration should occur for a project well over budget.
"We need to retrofit the east pier (where the rods broke), and may need to retrofit the celebration too," Heminger said.
After the hearing, state Sen. Anthony Cannella, R-Ceres, issued a statement saying he has "grave concerns over the construction of the new eastern span."
"In addition, when it comes to the bolts that we have seen fail, Caltrans deliberately chose to ignore industry and their own standards for the types of metal to be used in a marine environment. This simply cannot be shrugged off as merely a 'bad batch' of bolts," the statement said.
