Australia's Bridges: Kurilpa Bridge across the Brisbane River in Queensland (2)

March 2011 (-27.469 deg., 153.018 deg.) Kurilpa Bridge

A view of the Kurilpa Bridge from the deck of the Victoria Bridge as I raced to catch the Brisbane River ferry. 

Brisbane held a contest to rename what was the 'Tank Street Bridge' and the aboriginal word for 'place for water rats' overwhelmingly won. A similarity (besides Ove Arup as the engineer) with London's Millennium Bridge is that both bridges carry pedestrians across rivers to museums of modern art. That may be the compelling reason for creating a 'visionary' bridge.

As can be seen in the photo, the Kurilpa Bridge is a three span structure on tapered, two-column bents. Although most of the masts/towers are supported at the bents, there are also masts/towers along all three spans. Whether those elements actually carry compression forces is doubtful. More likely they are in tension and help support the spans. On the Wikipedia website, we can see that during construction, the cantilevered superstructure is supported by the masts.

The bridge rises to the north to provide clearance for the Pacific Motorway/Coronation Drive Bridges. Consequently, the cyclists are either standing on their pedals or freewheeling downhill. Hopefully, the pedestrians are well-protected.

Australia's Bridges: Kurilpa Bridge across the Brisbane River in Queensland (2) by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Australia's Bridges: Kurilpa Bridge across the Brisbane River in Queensland (1)

March 2011 (-27.469 deg., 153.018 deg.) Kurilpa Bridge

If the Goodwill Bridge is odd, then the Kurilpa Bridge is odder. The team of Cox Rayner Architects and Ove Arup Engineers must have decided to push the envelope even farther on their next bridge over the Brisbane River.  I think Arup's reputation as a designer of interesting pedestrian bridges is enhanced by this project, but it's not a very efficient structure.

Two years ago The Happy Pontist wrote several articles about 'tensegrity bridges,' based on Buckminster Fuller's idea of a structure that optimizes the use of tension elements. However, the Pontist felt the Kurilpa Bridge was just a variant of the cable-stayed bridge and terribly expensive. Perhaps it is more effective as a symbol of all the tall-masted ships that came to colonize Australia.

We'll take a closer look at the bridge tomorrow.

Australia's Bridges: Kurilpa Bridge across the Brisbane River in Queensland (1) by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Australia's Bridges: Victoria Bridge across the Brisbane River in Queensland (3)

March 2011 (-27.472 deg., 153.021 deg.) Victoria Bridge

A last look at the Victoria Bridge. It cost $3.2 million Australian in 1969 and it still looks pretty good.  

In California when we build a box girder bridge, we make the soffit continuous under the girders. However this bridge has three separate box girders connected by a precast deck. I've seen precast deck panels that are connected by closure pours over the webs. Maybe this bridge has something similar. Nice looking light poles too.

This area is getting crowded with bridges, and its going to get worse. They're going to build a parallel structure since the current bridge is mostly devoted to heavy occupancy vehicles. I like to have some distance between bridges, especially between elegant bridges, and I think the river will become less attractive with wall to wall bridges.

You can see the new Kurilpa Bridge in the background.

Australia's Bridges: Victoria Bridge across the Brisbane River in Queensland (3) by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.