Niigata Japan's Bridges: Japan Rail Bridges across the U River (2)

August 2007 (37.3619 Degrees, 138.5493 Degrees) Japan Railway Bridges

Another look at the Japan Rail U River Bridges.  The rail crew was just leaving for lunch when we arrived at the site. We inspected the deck, the rail, the embankment, the abutments, the piers, and the bearings but there was no obvious damage so they may have doing routine maintenance.

When we looked at the abutments we found bedding and a mattress similar to what we often see under US bridges.

Niigata Japan's Bridges: Japan Rail Bridges across the U River (2) by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

Japan's Bridges: Tenno Bridges in Miyagi Prefecture (1)

June 2011 (38.492 Degrees, 141.290 Degrees) Tenno Bridges

Continuing north we came to the Tenno Road and Foot Bridges that carry Route 45 (the Ichinoseki Highway) over the Onagawa River. The bridges were too far upstream to be impacted by the tsunami, but the road bridge suffered ground shaking damage to the bracing between the arch ribs and under the deck. This damage was due to buckling of the braces and tearing of the gusset plates. There was also some pier wall damage from an earlier earthquake that finally got repaired after the March earthquake.

These structures (built in 1965) are both tied arch bridges with steel I girders for hangers. The hangers are flared at the top where they attach to the arch ribs. Most of the bridge was put together with high-strength bolts, but it looks like rivets were used for the arch ribs.

It seems that the Japanese make use a large variety of bridges for river crossings and they don't seem to mind the added expense of a separate superstructure for the walkway.

Japan's Bridges: Tenno Bridges in Miyagi Prefecture (1) by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.