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Highest Bridge in the World Nearing Completion
An anonymous reader writes "A weekend cookie for all engineering geeks out here. The central span of the Millau bridge (270 meters or 886 ft) has been completed!" The photo is awesome.
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That sure is some bridge, but must be a real eyesore to those who have to live near it.
Well, in fact, they are the same folks... 2E airport terminal was built by Vinci and Eiffage. Millau viaduc is built by Eiffage alone.
no, but the architect is Sir Norman Foster of Foster and Partners, responsible for the Millenium Footbridge in London that had to be closed after it was found to be dangerous... ...I'll follow you over...
'This writing business. Pencils and what-not. Over-rated if you ask me. Silly stuff. Nothing in it' - Eeyore
They built it because every summer thousands of cars get stuck in Millau while traveling from north to south.
Maybe it's a suspension vs. non-suspension thing.
-Rob
Marriage doesn't have to suck!
There are also seven temporary pillars, soon to be removed. The central core, north, is 717m, and wings are about 670m. At south, the central core is 1744m, with wings 1573m.
The motorway is two lanes wide in each direction with a three-metre wide hard shoulder on each side and a one-metre wide bande dérasée next to the central crash barrier.
And for all you Americans joking about the terminal collapse, consider that in France, bridges are built. In America, bridges are burned--figuratively, of course, since the terrorists have not (yet) taken down your tallest bridges. Give them time, or peace be with you.
Mod parent up!
From the site:
"Eiffage was selected to carry out this project combining the techniques of concrete with those of steel.
Constituting the last stretch of the A75 motorway, once opened it will enable Clermont-Ferrand to be reached directly from Béziers, so getting rid of the infamous Millau traffic bottleneck."
Fred
"A fool and his freedom are soon parted"
-RMS
Sorry but last I checked the Royal Gorge Bridge (in Colorado, USA) is still higher. Built in 1929 too.
1053 feet. Roughly 320.95 meters. Or 50 meters higher.
info here
I forget...are we at war with Eurasia or East Asia?
Major writeup of the project:
http://www.a75.com/viaducengl.html
The pictures may be misleading, but there aren't exactly offramps into the town. So:
1.) There is less traffic going through the town, less of a need to stop in the town, and it is harder to stop in town.
2.) It has never been about tourism for Millau. the town is in the way, and the bridge serves to get people from one big city to the coast, circumventing Millau.
In a nutshell "We're Millau. We built a huge freaking bridge that goes around our city so people don't have to drive through here any more. Come visit us!"
You can see some more pictures of this project, along with some of the artist renderings of what the thing will look like when done, here.
Double inaccuracy... first of all, the millenium bridge was by Lord Foster, not Sir Foster (if you think such details are irrelevant, try talking about Congressman Kerry and Prime Minister Bush). And secondly, it was never found to be dangerous. It was closed temporarily when it was found to sway several feet from side to side under heavy foot traffic due to an unforeseen resonance at around the frequency of human walking. (Frankly, this was the falt of the engineers more than the architect.) This was fixed by adding a few dampers and now it's perfectly steady.
The author of this post asserts his moral rights.
The road will have two lanes (3.50m each) on each side and will run at about 270m above the river Tarn. The Millau Viaduct will not be straight. A straight road could induce a sensation of floating for drivers. A slight curve will remedy that. The curve will be of 20km in range. Moreover, the road will have a light hill of 3% to improve the visibility and reassure the driver. A 3m wide emergency lane will bring increased security. It will, in particular, prevent drivers from seeing the valley from the viaduct. As the bridge will be exposed to winds of up to 151km/h, side screens will reduce the effects of the wind by 50%. The speed of the wind at the level of the road will therefore reflect to speed of the wind found at ground level around Larzac and Sauveterre.
l lau_viaduct/
From http://www.roadtraffic-technology.com/projects/mi
IIRC, a LOT of trucks take that road every year, so building a road around Millau still solves just part of the problem: it will be a lot easier and faster for everyone to just take a straight line rather than going down in the valley, through the valley, and up again. IIRC, they claim the trips will be 1 to 2 hours shorter thanks to the bridge -that's less time on the road, therefore safer overall, less pollution etc...
This is an entirely private project, the french govt didn't want to pay for it. That's bad for the drivers though, who will have to pay a lot of money to cross the bridge.
Hello! I'm a disaster waiting to happen!
Bush was never a Prime Minister, AFAK...
But if he were it would be improper to call him President Bush in anything other than the past tense.
Jimmy Carter is "President" Carter only when refering to a time when he was the actual sitting President, and contemporaneously he may be properly refered to as "Former President" Carter or addressed as "Mr." Carter.
Nevermind the fact that "President" and "Prime Misister" are actually the names of the offices, not a title, and the forms are different. To take something of an extreme example it would be improper to address Wendy Carlos as "Mr.".
If one did address Ms. Carlos as Mr. or "The former Mr. Carlos" it would likely be taken as a delibate slight at his current status.
So too, for addressing Lord Norman Foster as the "Former Sir." Without contextual qualifications it implies an impuning of his right to be a Lord.
misterpies made a double error of his own, however. There is not, and never was either a Sir or Lord Foster. The title attaches to the name of the recipient, not the recipient's father.
Thus it is Sir/Lord Norman, or Sir/Lord Norman Foster, but never Sir/Lord Foster (Just as Churchill was Lord Randolph).
KFG
It may be a flat valley, but the drop-offs into the valley are quite steep.
Thanks to another poster above, check out this page, particularly the photo right at the bottom. You can see how difficult it would be to get an expressway down into the valley and then back up. The page also shows the various options considered, as well as the reasons for accepting the tall viaduct.
Look at the tomato! Isn't it sad? He can't dance! Poor tomato!