Bidders line up as St Lawrence PPP prepares for launch

The newsletter for subscribers to Bridge design & engineering
UPDATE
Issue 125 | July 2014
Bridges 2015:
save the date!
This event, which has been firmly
established in the calendar of UK bridge
engineers for more than 20 years, has
expanded over the last three years to
take on a more international flavour with
the input of Bd&e magazine.
Whether you want to find out what’s
happening in the UK local-authority
bridge sector; if your interests lie in
international projects; or if you simply
want to network and meet engineers and
bridge owners in the British market and
beyond, this is the event for you.
An exhibition alongside the conference
programme will provide opportunities
to meet companies offering specialist
products and services for the industry.
T
hree of six shortlisted multi-national consortia
will this month be invited to participate in the
request for proposals for the new bridge over
the St Lawrence River in Montréal, Canada. Last month
client Infrastructure Canada revealed the reference
design which the three teams will have to adhere to – a
distinctive cable-supported bridge design which was
developed by Arup and Dissing & Weitling. The new bridge
is intended to carry light rail as well as highway traffic,
and the reference design has three decks – two decks
each carrying three lanes of road traffic, and a middle
deck which will be designed to carry two tracks of light
rail. A pedestrian and cycle route will be included next to
one of the road decks.
The new crossing, which is due to be completed by the
end of 2018, will replace the ageing Champlain Bridge and
is expected to be one of the largest infrastructure projects
in North America. Six consortia were prequalified for the
public-private-partnership scheme, and the three highestscoring will be invited to take part in the bidding process
when it is launched at the end of July. They will have until
February 2015 to submit their proposals, and the winning
bidder is expected to be announced in April 2015.
The Champlain Bridge is used by up to 60 million
vehicles per year and is one of the busiest vehicle
crossings in Canada, vital to both the Quebec and
Canadian economy.
The development of the reference design came
about through a collaborative process. An architectural
review panel of architect Poul Ove Jensen from Dissing &
Weitling, local firm Provencher Roy, the City of Montréal,
(Photo: Dissing & Weitling/Infrastructure Canada)
The annual Bridge design & engineering/
Surveyor bridges event will be held in
Manchester, UK, on 25th March 2015.
Bidders line up as St Lawrence
PPP prepares for launch
Mission Design, Heritage Montréal, the Ordre des
ingénieurs du Québec and the Ordre des architectes du
Québec developed the design in collaboration with Arup,
project engineering consultant for the new bridge.
The six consortia are: Signature on the St. Lawrence
Group (SNC-Lavalin, ACS Infrastructure, Hochtief,
Dragados, Flatiron Construction, TY Lin International,
International Bridge Technologies); St. Lawrence Corridor
Mobility Partners (Cintra Infraestructuras, Hyundai
Engineering & Construction, Ferrovial Agroman, Louis
Berger, Klohn Crippen Berger, Hardesty & Hanover, Urban
Systems); Saint-Laurent Alliance (Kiewit, Skanska, Aecon,
WSP, Buckland & Taylor, Parsons Brinckerhoff Halsall); St.
Lawrence New Bridge Partnership (OHL Infrastructure,
Samsung E&C, Acciona Infrastructure, Hatch Mott
MacDonald, Dessau, Ramboll); Corridor 10-15 Consortium
(Vinci, Bouygues Travaux Publics, Aecom, Parsons);
Montreal Gateway Infrastructure Access (Astaldi, Daelim
Industrial, Egis Projects, Eiffage, Stantec Consulting, DM
Engineering, T ingenierie, Greisch Ingenerie)
©2014 Acrow Corporation of America
Acrow Bridge
www.acrow.com
sales@acrow.com
+1.973.244.0080
NEW ON
BRIDGEWEB
n VIDEOS
Fly-through of the new bridge
design proposed to replace
the Champlain Bridge over the
St Lawrence River in Montreal,
Canada.
Film telling the story of
the online reconstruction
of the Henry G Gilmerton
Bridge in the USA.
n EVENTS
Zimbabwe government assumes
ownership of Limpopo River bridge
T
he Alfred Beit Road Bridge over the Limpopo
River between Zimbabwe and South Africa
has become the first transport infrastructure
in Africa to be handed back to a government at the
expiry of a build, operate and transfer agreement.
The 462m-long bridge, which has concrete piers, was
built in 1994 by New Limpopo Bridge which also held the
20-year concession for its operation and maintenance.
Private firm NLB is a Zimbabwe affiliate of NLPI, whose
shareholders include major South African financial
institutions Nedbank, Old Mutual and Sanlam.
NLB handed over the toll bridge, built on its behalf
by Murray & Roberts between Messina in South Africa
and Beitbrdige in Zimbabwe, in late June.
Zimbabwe transport minister Dr Obert Mpofu
said: “The New Limpopo Bridge is the first major
infrastructure project in Zimbabwe undertaken by the
private sector under BOT.”
He said private-public-partnerships were an
alternative method by which cash-strapped economies
m
Call for papers
11-15 January 2015: TRB annual meeting, USA.
Abstracts by 1 August 2014.
7-9 September 2015: SMAR 2015, Turkey.
Abstracts by 30 November 2014.
14-16 September 2015: Eighth international
symposium on steel bridges, Turkey.
Abstracts by 31 October 2014.
27-29 July 2016: ICSA 2016, Portugal.
Abstracts by 15 February 2015.
n NEWS
Delaware Bridge repairs at critical phase
Thames bridge competition plans announced
Go-ahead for anti-suicide nets on Golden Gate Bridge
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2 | Bridge update | Issue 125 | July 2014
could finance infrastructure in Africa. This is especially
relevant to Zimbabwe, which is currently grappling
with international economic sanctions over its
dictatorial regime.
Mpofu said traffic coming into Zimbabwe will
pay toll fees to the Zimbabwe National Road
Administration but it is yet to be confirmed which
agency will handle South Africa’s revenue collection.
New Limpopo Bridge shareholder representative
Thomas Proustow said a total of 10 million vehicles
have used the bridge since 1994.
An estimated 8,000 travellers pass through the
border port of entry daily; the South African Ministry
of Transport reports that this number rises to 20,000
during peak periods.
At least 2,100 buses, 14,000 haulage trucks and
25,000 private cars go through the shared bridge
monthly. The bridge is parallel to the original Alfred
Beit Road Bridge which was completed in 1929.
Shem Oirere
FREE FLOW
A 760m-long bridge which
will provide a new route to
the historic island of Mont
St Michel in France is due
to open to pedestrians later
this month, with shuttle
buses starting to run on
the structure in September.
Once the bridge is in use,
the causeway which is
currently used for access to
the island, a World Heritage
Site, will be removed to allow
water to flow around Mont
St Michel once more. The
new bridge was designed by
Feichtinger Architects and
Schlaich Bergermann & Partners and built by steel contractor Eiffage. The curved route of the footbridge is designed to lead the
pedestrian in a sweeping motion to the island, offering different views along the way. Its design was inspired by a classic boat
quay; piers made of thin steel columns to minimise the impact on the tidal flow, and a concrete slab on the top. The column
spacing of 12m enables the reduction in the slab cross-section to be maximised, so that the bridge appears to float above
the water and the wooden footway rests on steel cantilevers. Once the bridge is open, visitors will only be able to access the
monastory by foot or on a shuttle bus from the shore. The new access route cost around US$47.6 million and is part of a larger
scheme which also involved construction of a new dam on the river, intended to prevent the bay from silting up. The entire
project, which has cost some US$252 million, is due for completion in 2015.
email: customer@hgluk.com
www.bridgeweb.com
m
NEWS IN BRIEF
THE BANGLADESH finance minister has announced
that construction of the Padma Bridge will begin
in November, after the government completed the
signing of the US$1.6 billion contract with China
Major Bridge Engineering Company. The Chinese
company has submitted performance guarantees
equal to 10.17% of the full value of the contract
with the United Commercial Bank. As part of the
agreement, in June, CMBECL paid US$234 million
to the Bangladesh government as an advance
payment. The firm must now present a work schedule,
after which it will be given the go-ahead to start
construction, which must be completed by 2018. In
the meantime, three companies have submitted bids
for the contract to undertake river training. These
were Hyundai Construction of South Korea, Sinohydro
of China, and Jan de Nul, Belgium. The winning bid
will be announced at the end of this month (July).
Significantly, Bangladesh Bank has waived the single
borrower exposure limit for companies working on
the project. It justified this given the importance
of the bridge and also because of ‘government
priorities’. Under normal circumstances, banks cannot
extend loans that exceed 35% of the total capital
at any point in time to a single party. However, this
exposure limit will not be applicable to contractors
working on the Padma Bridge.
SIX BRIDGES are to be built in Oman, as part of a
plan to upgrade the Taqah-Mirbat highway to dual
carriageway status at a cost of US$105 million.
These six bridges – five flyovers and one wadi bridge
– will be built over the next three years as part of a
project that is aiming to open up large areas of the
Dhofar coastal area. Construction will be undertaken
by Galfar Engineering & Contracting on behalf of
the Ministry of Transport & Communications. The
contract covers a 34km-long stretch of road, with
the five bridge structures and a single underpass
accounting for the majority of the budget. The
grade-separated flyovers are needed to separate
conflicting traffic streams.
COMMERCIAL DRIVERS in Ghana are warning that
two bridges on the Salaga-Makango Road are on the
verge of collapse. The drivers report heavy vibrations
whenever large vehicles cross the bridges, from
which metal slabs, concrete and steel rods are either
hanging or have already fallen into the river. Some
drivers are having to offload cargo before they take their
vehicles across the bridges, after which they are forced
to manually reload. Passengers on buses are routinely
being asked to get off and walk over the bridges.
IN NIGERIA, the Delta State Government has given the
go-ahead for a new US$184 million bridge which will
be built in the town of Tuomo. This will be the second
bridge the government is building in the Ijaw area, with
construction of the Egbo-Ayakelemor bridge already
under way.
JAPAN’S INFRASTRUCTURE Ministry is planning to set up
a new subsidy system to start in the 2015 fiscal year, to
finance major repairs to bridges and tunnels by either
municipal or prefectural governments. As part of the
plans, the Ministry may well assume half of the cost of
such repairs in the form of subsidy and wants to include
a provision for this in its budget request for the year
beginning 1 April 2015. Many of the structures involved
were built in the 1960s, with the cost of maintaining them
proving to be a drain on local and regional authorities.
The Ministry believes that some form of financial
assistance is necessary to maintain minimum safety
standards. Japan has around 700,000 road bridges,
of which 500,000 are maintained by municipalities. In
2013, road traffic on 2,104 bridges was disrupted by work
undertaken because of safety problems; this is almost
twice as high as was the case in 2008. In some areas, a
shortage of funds and a lack of trained engineers has
resulted in some roads having to be closed, because of an
inability to maintain bridges to an acceptable standard.
As of this month (July), the Ministry has mandated that
all road bridges will have to be visually inspected every
five years. To ensure that personnel trained to do this
are available, the Ministry is planning a pooling system
covering neighbouring municipalities.
THE PANAMANIAN government has approved a contract
signed by the Panama Canal Authority for a loan of
US$450 million to partially complete the financing of
a new road bridge at the Atlantic end of the canal.
The overall cost of the structure is US$530 million; the
ACP used its own resources to begin work in 2011 and
awarded the construction contract for the third canal
bridge to Vinci Construction Grands Projets in January
2013. The concrete cable-stayed bridge, which will be
built in Colón province, will be 1,050m long and carry
four lanes of traffic.
JÉRÔME STUBLER has taken over as director general
of Vinci Construction from the start of this month
(July) and at the same time became a member of the
executive board of the Vinci Group. Stubler began
his career with Vinci subsidiary Freyssinet in 1989,
where he was in charge of major projects such as
the Normandy Bridge, among others. Since 2002 he
was involved with the development of Nuvia, a new
subsidiary specialising in engineering for the nuclear
power industry. Since 2009, he has been director
general of Freyssinet and Terre Armée and president
of Nuvia.
A TOTAL of 51 bridges will be replaced as part of a
US$850 million project to modernise some 29km
of the I-75 freeway in Oakland County, Michigan, in
the USA. Parsons Brinckerhoff has been awarded
a contract to assist the Michigan Department of
Transportation with the delivery of the project, which
involves reconstruction of the highway, along with
the addition of the first high-occupancy vehicle lanes
in the state. The project also includes reconstruction
of the existing pavement, drainage improvements,
and upgrading of geometrics and interchanges. One
new lane will be added in each direction to serve as
an HOV lane during peak periods. The I-75 corridor
is divided into eight segments with the first to be
delivered under a design-build contract and the
remaining seven segments delivered through designbid-build. Completion of the overall project is slated
for 2032.
FOUR CONTRACTOR joint ventures have been
invited to submit proposals for the design,
construction and maintenance of the Harbor Bridge
replacement project in Corpus Christi, Texas. The
Texas Department of Transportation is pursuing a
design-build agreement with a single contractor to
develop, design, construct and potentially maintain
and partially finance the project. The timeline
calls for proposals to be submitted in early 2015
followed by the awarding of a conditional contract
in the spring and approval of a final contract in
the summer of next year. The teams are: Flatiron/
Dragados, JV; Harbor Bridge Constructors with Walsh
Infrastructure; Harbor Bridge Constructors with
Traylor Bros and Zachary Construction; and Harbor
Bridge Partners with Kiewit Development and Kiewit
Infrastructure South.
HARMONIC
HIGHLIGHT
LOUISIANA LINK STEPS LIGHTLY
OVER THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER
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Thames footbridge design
competition gears up for launch
A
n international competition to design a US$68
million bridge across the River Thames in
London, UK, could be launched by the end
of 2014, after plans for a new pedestrian and cycle
crossing were approved by Wandsworth Council this
month.
The new structure would be upstream of London’s
city centre, connecting Nine Elms on the south bank
with the Pimlico embankment on the north. Its exact
location has not yet been confirmed, but the preferred
options are close to the site of the new US Embassy.
The bridge would be part of a US$3.4 billion
infrastructure package which is intended to transform
the Nine Elms redevelopment area, which includes the
former Battersea Power Station, into a new central
London transport hub complete with two new tube
stations.
The plan for the design competition comes after a
feasibility study by Transport For London confirmed
the bridge had the potential to carry around 9,000
pedestrians and 9,000 cyclists a day, proving an
alternative to adjacent road bridges.
m
Although the study indicated that construction of a
bridge at this location would be feasible in engineering
and construction terms, significant issues relating to
the bridge location and landings on the north and south
of the river would have to be resolved.
Potential demand would be tempered by the likely
need for stairs and lifts since the deck would have to
provide the navigational clearance for river traffic.
Initial work suggests that achieving ramps on both
banks is likely to be difficult due to the height of the
bridge structure.
Cost estimates suggest it could be in the region of
US$68 million, based on either a tied arch or cable-stayed
structure accessed at both ends via stairs and lifts.
Plans for the competition are now being finalised
with an official launch set to take place before the
end of the year. A shortlist would be selected in early
2015 and the winning design announced in spring the
same year.
Once a design is in place Wandsworth Council will
explore further funding options, including sponsorship,
which could see the bridge built sooner.
WINNING WAYS
The Taizhou Bridge over the Yangtze
River at Jiangsu in China has been
named as the winner of the IABSE
Outstanding Structure Award in
the 2014 awards programme. The
structure was hailed by the judges
as ‘a breakthrough in engineering
and construction to span over
large distances’. They said that
‘the Taizhou Bridge ushers in a
new generation of multiple-longspan, continuous suspension
bridges’. The Taizhou Bridge is the
world’s first long-span, three-tower
suspension bridge; it has two main
spans each 1,080m long, carries
six lanes of traffic, and straddles
the two navigation channels of
the Yangtze River. Considerable
research and development efforts went into solving the issues created by the asymmetric live loading, which is the
unique feature of the bridge. The team developed innovative solutions, including a central tower that was sufficiently stiff
and yet flexible enough to meet the structural requirements. The client is the Jiangsu Provincial Yangtze River Highway
Bridge Construction Commanding Department, main contractors were the Second Navigational Engineering Bureau and
the Second Highway Engineering Bureau of China Communications Construction Company, and other subcontractors
were China Railway Baoji Bridge Group, Jiangsu Fasten Nippon Steel Cable Company and the Civil Engineering Institute
of Southwest Jiaotong University. The 2014 International Award of Merit in Structural Engineering will be presented to
William Baker of the USA, ‘for extending the profession of structural engineering with his ability to create clear solutions
to complex engineering problems in structural systems for supertall buildings, long-span roofs and speciality structures’.
Professor Guido Morgenthal of Germany has been awarded the IABSE Prize to recognise his significant contributions to
the fields of structural dynamics and wind engineering and his involvement in many long-span bridges: The Technical
Paper award was won by Rehabilitation of the suspension bridge over Zambezi River in Mozambique by António Reis and
Claudio Baptista, while the Scientific Paper award went to Vibration mechanisms and controls of long-span bridges: a
review by Yozo Fujino and Dionysius Siringoringo.
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