Concrete Creates Environmentally Friendly Bridge

The 7,780-ft long Sidney Lanier bridge in Brunswick, Ga., provides an elegant cable-stayed crossing of the Brunswick River, and also interacts well with the area's wildlife.

The Brunswick River and four islands near the bridge (Sea Island, Jekyll Island, St. Simons island, and Little St. Simon Island) are home to federally endangered loggerhead sea turtles. Manatees were also frequent swimmers in the river and care was taken to protect the manatees. The bridge was designed to accomodate the needs of these species. More on the Sidney Lanier bridge.

Submit Your Bridge for the 2012 Concrete Bridge Awards Competition

There’s still time to submit your bridge for the 13th biennial Concrete Bridge Awards Competition, co-sponsored by PCA and Roads & Bridges magazine. Bridges of all types—highway, railway, transit, pedestrian, and wildlife crossings—in which the basic structural system is concrete are eligible. Entries are encouraged for cast-in-place or precast bridges (or combinations) with short, medium, or long spans. These bridges can be newly constructed, rehabilitated, or widened structures.

To be eligible, bridges must have been essentially completed between September 2009 and September 2011. Entries are due February 29, 2012. Interested owners, consultants, contractors, or suppliers can submit entries online, or by downloading an Entry Form and submitting a hard copy version.

Awards will be presented at the 2012 American Concrete Institute’s Fall Meeting in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, October 21-25, 2012. Winners will be announced in Roads & Bridges magazine, by PCA, and by other professional publications.

For more information contact Ms. Alpa Swinger at PCA at 847-972-9110 or aswinger@cement.org.

Engineering Firm Creates "Hypar Nature"

The ARC International Wildlife Crossing Infrastructure Design Competition has announced its winning entry, and that entry employs concrete. HNTB Engineering with Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc. won the competition with their creation of “hypar nature.”

The HNTB team’s design involved precast concrete modules cast in a hyperbolic parabaloid (or “hypar”) shape. One module is placed on each side of the roadway and then connected at midspan. These shapes serve as abutment, beam, and deck, and are efficient, cost-effective, and easy to transport and construct. More on the ARC winner.

Seven Questions for Paul Liles

In this segment, PCA interviews prominent bridge engineers—the leaders and innovators in the field—to get their opinions on the state of the industry and challenges facing all who work with bridges.

Paul Liles, the assistant division director of engineering for the Georgia Department of Transportation, answers seven questions relating to his career in bridge engineering. Read the interview.

Relative Price of Concrete for Bridge Construction

The United States’ bridge infrastructure will require serious repair and replacement in the near future. According to the 2010 National Bridge Inventory data posted by the Federal Highway Administation, more than 26 percent, or one in four, of the nation’s bridges, are either structurally deficient or functionally obsolete.

Concrete’s competitive position for the needed bridge construction is enhanced by its relative price. The concrete price indexes have remained relatively flat from 2008, whereas steel’s have been volatile and once again are trending up. The Steel PPI was up 13.5 percent in September from last year’s levels, and the concrete PPI was up just slightly at 0.3 percent. PCA expects global demand conditions to continue to grow along with increases in construction material prices. Steel prices are expected to increase by 16 percent in 2011, while prices are expected to further increase 33 percent by 2016 from 2010 levels.

More information at PCA's newest Competitive Materials Report.

Q: Is Your Wildlife Crossing Effective?

A: Often engineers and planners are tasked with reducing the impact of our transportation infrastructure on ecology and wildlife. New structures can be built to try to maximize the safe passage of animals under, over, or around infrastructure. However, in many instances, existing bridges and culverts can be modified to enhance the ability of wildlife to cross safely. A recently released report is now available to help engineers and planners with evaluating existing bridge and culverts as wildlife crossings.

“Permeability of Existing Structures to Terrestrial Wildlife: A Passage Assessment System,” report number. WA-RD-777.1, was issued by the Washington State Department of Transportation. The authors provide a classification system for underpasses, overpasses, and culverts based on the sizes and types of animals that need to cross (from reptiles and amphibians to black bears). The Passage Assessment System (PAS) provides a series of questions for engineers and planners to answer to determine if the existing structure can serve adequately as a wildlife crossing. If the structure has the potential to be sued as a wildlife crossing, then a toolbox is supplied for actions that can be taken to improve the existing structure for wildlife.

Read the full report.

FHWA Announces Research, Planning, Design, and Construction Opportunities

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) recently announced multiple opportunities for its 2012 Discretionary Grant Programs. These grants cover a multitude of subjects, including:

• Innovative Bridge Research and Deployment—$4.2 million is available for development of new, cost-effective, innovative bridge applications and construction techniques, with a preference given to accelerated bridge construction
• Highways for Life—$9.5 million is available for projects that demonstrate faster construction, improved quality, increased safety, and improved user satisfaction
• Rail Highway Crossing Hazard Elimination in High Speed Rail Corridors—$7.1 million is available for projects that improve safety at both public and private highway-rail grade crossings along 11 federally designated high-speed rail corridors
• Transportation, Community, and System Preservation Program—$29 million is available for projects that improve the efficiency of the U.S. transportation system and/or reduce impacts of transportation on the environment
• Interstate Maintenance—$47.3 million is available for resurfacing, restoration, rehabilitation, and reconstruction projects
• Public Lands Highways—$45 million is available for projects within, adjacent to, or which provide access to Federal lands or facilities
• Delta Region Transportation Development—$4.7 million is available for transportation planning and construction projects in the Delta region of Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, and Tennessee
• National Scenic Byways Program—$20.6 million is available to manage and protect highways having outstanding scenic, historic, cultural, natural, recreational, and archeological qualities.

Applications are due January 6, 2012. More information

 

TRB 91st Annual Meeting will be held January 22-26, 2012, in Washington, D.C. It is sponsored by the Transportation Research Board.

World of Concrete/World of Masonry will be held January 23-27, 2012 in Las Vegas, Nev. Click here for free registration and a discount on seminars.

 

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