The landmark bridge is more than 3km long and will connect Cadiz with Puerto Real, the northern area of old town. It is designed by Carlos Fernandez Casado, and built by Dragados-Drace joint venture.
ALE identified two elements of the project; the transportation and lifting of the cable-stayed sections, as well as the transportation, load-out and lifting of the removal span. So far, ALE has installed 50 bridge sections varying in weight and size, with lengths from 10m – 52m and weights between 150t – 1055t.
To perform these transportation and lifting operations, ALE has used SPMT axles for onshore transportation, four mobile gantry structures, eight HLS2000 strandjack units and eight SLS2000 strandjack units, eight skidshoes SS500, eight push-pull units SS300 and 16 push-pull units SS150. ALE supplied 168 axle lines of SPMT to perform the load-out of the heaviest section.
After this load-out, the final operations consisted of lifting and shifting the deck using complex steel structures and strand jack units HLS8500, with a total lifting capacity of 6,800t, whilst controlling the ballasting of the barge where the biggest section was transported.
A full report on the installation of the main span, will be published in issue 78 of Bridge design & engineering, in the first week of March 2015.
