Demolition

If you've driven on Interstate 95 from New Jersey into Pennsylvania at any point, then you've done two things.

First, you've gone over the Scudders Falls Bridge. Second, you haven't paid a toll to do so.

All of this will be changing soon. The old Scudders Falls Bridge is on its last legs, soon to be replaced by a brand-new version, one that opens in July. And, progress being what it is, there will also be a toll.

If TB understands it correctly, if you have EZ Pass, it'll be $1.25 to go from New Jersey into Pennsylvania and nothing to go the other way. If you don't have EZ Pass, then that becomes $2.60 to get into Pennslyvania.

When TB saw this the other day, it got him thinking about how many times he's driven over that bridge and how much money he would have spent by now had it had a $1.25 toll each time he crossed the Delaware into Pennsylvania. It would be thousands of dollars, since there have been days when he's gone back and forth five or more times.

The new bridge has been constructed directly next to the old one. Once it opens, the old one will be torn down and a second bridge will be built in its place. For now, until that it completed, the new bridge will have traffic going both ways.

TigerBlog has ridden his bicycle under the old bridge and the new bridge as he's gone along the Delaware River. When you're underneath looking up, you can definitely tell the difference between the old one, which opened in 1961, and the new one.

In fact, it reminded TigerBlog of the last days of old Palmer Stadium, which stood where Princeton Stadium now does from 1914 until March of 1997.

It's amazing to think about how many people TigerBlog currently works with who never went to a game in Palmer Stadium. TB went to a lot of them there, and his memories of the building are much fonder now than they were back when he was lugging a copy machine up through the stands to the press box or the way the wind whipped through that press box in the late season.

Palmer Stadium's press box was two levels, and TB used to run stats up to the TV and radio booths several times a game. It was open air, with nothing remotely resembling a frill to it, and yet it had its charms.

And of course, it gets more charming with the passing of time.

By the mid-1990s, it was clear that Palmer was on its last legs. The most obvious indicator of this was the orange and black netting that had to be installed underneath the concrete to prevent it from falling on the people who happened to be walking around the facility.

The 1996 season was Princeton football's last at Palmer Stadium, which means that the stadium was the home of Tiger football for just about half of its 150 years of existence. TB has seen pictures of the place from the 1920s where the stands were packed and the "parking lot" was filled with horses, not cars. He saw a picture from the last 1940s that said "Press Box - No Women Allowed."

The first game TB saw at Palmer Stadium was a Princeton-Penn game where he did student radio for the Quakers. He covered games there when Bob Surace was the center, before he became the head coach.

And he was there on the morning when the stadium was torn down.

It was a sunny day, and there was a ceremony to have the first sledgehammer swung to start the process. There were also bulldozer-like vehicles with claws on the end that sort of made them seem like dinosaurs.

The plan, as TB remembers it, was that it would take two weeks or so to tear down the entire building. The dinosaur claws started at one end and pulled down a small block, and then they moved over a little and pulled another block.

When the claws got near the press box, they yanked - and the entire thing caved in like dominoes. It took about five seconds and the entire press box was down.

As TB stood there and watched it, he couldn't help but think about all the times he'd been up there, secure that the floor was not about to cave in under him. And then there it was, gone just like that.

He tries not to think about that as he drives over the old bridge.