Footbridge called “Za Sokolovnou” in Žamberk
On the site of the new footbridge stood a classic arched concrete footbridge from the beginning of the century, of which many were built in the past as a type of bridge structure for small rivers. The supporting structure consisted of a pair of 350 mm thick concrete arches. The locals were very fond of the bridge and did not want to give it up. Unfortunately, the original structure was in such poor condition that it had to be replaced with a new one. I came up with the concept of keeping the exact shape of the concrete arch on the side and casting it out of UHPC. The resulting thickness of the arch structure is 175 mm, i.e. half the thickness of the original concrete one and it looks very light. Thus, the silhouette of the original bridge has been preserved in the cityscape and the detail shows that it is a contemporary structure. The charm of this structure is precisely its shaped reference to the original footbridge, using modern UHPFRC arch construction, which has allowed the arches to be made as subtle as possible and of durable material. It is the only UHPFRC structure with an upper arch in the world. The fine steel hot-dip galvanized construction of the bridge deck itself is then sandwiched between them. The road is designed as a straight road at the bridge site, with no cross or longitudinal slope to the structure. The through width of the bridge is designed to be 2.2 m.
The superstructure can be defined as an arch bridge structure with a girder and a suspended lower bridge deck. The arches of the bridge are designed in UHPFRC material and stably secured by steel spans. The grated bridge deck serving as the drawbar of the arch is designed as steel and is suspended by rod hangers from the arch structure. At the foot of the arch, the steel bridge deck is connected to the arch using a pin connection. The arch structure is constructed as a precast concrete structure with a mounting joint at the top of the arch.
The exact halves of a pair of load-bearing arches were thus produced. The assembly joint at the top of the arch was concreted in-situ with the reinforcement. The precast girders were concreted in the "on-side" position, with the surface in contact with the formwork forming the outer contour of the bridge.
The bridge deck structure is made up of HEA 160 longitudinal and transverse sections. These form a total of seven spans. Each of the spans is diagonally braced by four members with a central rosette of 20 mm diameter. On the stringers are welded the anchorage brackets for the bridge deck's porous panels. Anchor points for the LED light bar are also welded on the inside of the stringers. This entire stringer is anchored to the bridge deck with four pins (2+2) at the ends of the bridge deck with an 85mm diameter pin. The bridge plate is split in half for ease of transport and the possibility of dip galvanizing. These two studs will be welded in the middle of the bridge span during construction. It is essential that the bridge deck is pre-stressed prior to welding to define the clearances in the studs and introduce the required stresses to ensure the stability of the UHPFRC arches.
Authors Petr Tej, Jan Mourek, Oto Melter, Jiří Kolísko, Aleš Hvízdal
Investor Město Žamberk
Year of realization 2023
Cooperation Skanska a.s. | generální dodavatel stavby | www.skanska.cz
KŠ Prefa | UHPFRC konstrukce | www.ksprefa.cz
CPOS s.r.o. | ocelové konstrukce | www.cpos.cz
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