37-738: Ponte Morandi (English: Morandi Bridge), officially Viadotto Polcevera (English: Polcevera Viaduct), was a road viaduct in Genoa , Liguria , Italy, constructed between 1963 and 1967 along the A10 motorway over the Polcevera River , from which it derived its official name. It connected Genoa's Sampierdarena and Cornigliano districts across the Polcevera Valley . The bridge was widely called "Ponte Morandi" after its structural designer, engineer Riccardo Morandi . On 14 August 2018,
74-585: A 210-metre (690 ft) section of the viaduct collapsed during a rainstorm, killing forty-three people. The collapse led to a year-long state of emergency in the Liguria region, extensive analysis of the structural failure, and widely varying assignment of responsibility. The remains of the original bridge were demolished in June 2019. The replacement bridge, the Genoa-Saint George Bridge
111-524: A difference could represent the entire effect of the non-linear pre-stresses. As little as a 2% shift could represent severe damage. The prestress in the Ponte Morandi was characterised as relatively small from the start. In contrast, with bare tendons, which are relatively under-constrained like the strings in a piano, the effect of prestress is dominant in determining the resonant frequency. Other than prestress, changes in geometry, such as corrosion in
148-419: A length of 1,182 metres (3,878 ft), a height above the valley of 45 metres (148 ft) at road level, and three reinforced concrete pylons reaching 90 metres (300 ft) in height; the maximum span was 210 metres (690 ft). It featured diagonal cable stays , with the vertical trestle -like supports made up of sets of Vs, one set carrying the roadway deck, while the other pair of inverted Vs supported
185-607: A repurposed rail viaduct provides a garden promenade on top and workspace for artisans below. The garden promenade is called the Coulée verte René-Dumont while the workspaces in the arches below are the Viaduc des Arts . The project was inaugurated in 1993. Manhattan's High Line , inaugurated in 2009, also uses an elevated train line as a linear urban park . In Indonesia viaducts are used for railways in Java and also for highways such as
222-408: A structural upgrade of the viaduct to the value of €20,159,000, with a deadline of 11 June 2018. The work on the reinforcement of the stays on pillars 9 and 10 would have needed to be finished within five years. Workers were installing new heavy concrete Jersey barriers on the Ponte Morandi before it collapsed, reducing the already low-compressive prestress on the concrete of the stays and increasing
259-523: A wide valley, road, river, or other low-lying terrain features and obstacles. The term viaduct is derived from the Latin via meaning "road", and ducere meaning "to lead". It is a 19th-century derivation from an analogy with ancient Roman aqueducts . Like the Roman aqueducts , many early viaducts comprised a series of arches of roughly equal length. The longest viaduct in antiquity may have been
296-604: Is a senior member of the Democratic Party . In 1999, he became a member of the municipal council of the Reggio Emilia province . In 2000, he was elected to the regional board and served as the president of the health and social politics commission for the province and as the member of the environment and territory commission. In 2004, he became a member of the Margherita Party and was elected as
333-507: Is built across land rather than water, the space below the arches may be used for businesses such as car parking, vehicle repairs, light industry, bars and nightclubs. In the United Kingdom, many railway lines in urban areas have been constructed on viaducts, and so the infrastructure owner Network Rail has an extensive property portfolio in arches under viaducts. In Berlin the space under the arches of elevated subway lines ( S-Bahn )
370-748: Is in endocrinology . He is close to the Communion and Liberation movement, and he spoke in the Rimini Meeting in August 2018. Delrio worked at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia as a faculty member and researcher. He is the founder and former director of the Giorgio la Pira Association, which was founded to promote cultural contact between Italy and the Middle East . He
407-407: Is used for several different purposes, including small eateries or bars. Elevated expressways were built in major cities such as Boston ( Central Artery ), Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seoul , Tokyo and Toronto ( Gardiner Expressway ). Some were demolished because they were unappealing and divided the city. In other cases, viaducts were demolished because they were structurally unsafe, such as
SECTION 10
#1732765464522444-655: The Bloor-Danforth subway line on the lower deck, over the steep Don River valley . Others were built to span settled areas, crossing over roads beneath—the reason for many viaducts in London. Viaducts over water make use of islands or successive arches. They are often combined with other types of bridges or tunnels to cross navigable waters as viaduct sections, while less expensive to design and build than tunnels or bridges with larger spans, typically lack sufficient horizontal and vertical clearance for large ships. See
481-542: The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel . The Millau Viaduct is a cable-stayed road-bridge that spans the valley of the river Tarn near Millau in southern France. It opened in 2004 and is the tallest vehicular bridge in the world, with one pier's summit at 343 metres (1,125 ft). The viaduct Danyang–Kunshan Grand Bridge in China was the longest bridge in the world as of 2011 . Where a viaduct
518-645: The Embarcadero Freeway in San Francisco, which was damaged by an earthquake in 1989. However, in developing nations such as Thailand ( Bang Na Expressway , the world's longest road bridge ), India ( Delhi-Gurgaon Expressway ), China, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Nicaragua, elevated expressways have been built and more are under construction to improve traffic flow, particularly as a workaround of land shortage when built atop surface roads. Other uses have been found for some viaducts. In Paris, France,
555-642: The Jakarta Inner Ring Road . In January 2019, the Alaskan Way Viaduct in Seattle was closed and replaced with a tunnel after several decades of use because it was seismically unsafe. Graziano Delrio Graziano Delrio (born 27 April 1960) is an Italian medical doctor and politician, who served in the government of Italy as Minister of Infrastructure and Transport from 2 April 2015 to 1 June 2018. He previously served as
592-626: The Pont Serme which crossed wide marshes in southern France. At its longest point, it measured 2,679 meters with a width of 22 meters. Viaducts are commonly used in many cities that are railroad hubs , such as Chicago, Birmingham, London and Manchester . These viaducts cross the large railroad yards that are needed for freight trains there, and also cross the multi-track railroad lines that are needed for heavy rail traffic. These viaducts provide grade separation and keep highway and city street traffic from having to be continually interrupted by
629-540: The A10 route through Genoa and over the bridge had become highly congested. The city council requested proposals for improvement of traffic flow through Genoa, with the Autostrade company in 2009 proposing the "Gronda di Ponente" project to improve flow, by moving traffic to a newly built Autostrada interchange system located to the north of the city. As part of the initial study and report, the Autostrade company measured that
666-538: The Morandi bridge needed maintenance. In 2017, a confidential university report in Genoa noted severe disparities in the behaviour of the stays of the pillar 9, which would collapse. The minutes of a February 2018 government meeting report that resistance and reflectometry measurements indicated an "average" reduction of the cross-section of the tendons of 10 to 20%. A crack in the road had appeared at least 14 days before
703-699: The Prime Minister Matteo Renzi 's office. In 2014, the Italian Parliament approved a law proposed by Del Rio, which abolished the Provinces of Italy , ascribing their political and administrative powers to the upper and lower constituent entities of the national jurisdiction (in Italian called comune and regione ). As of March 2021, the related reform was implemented by Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Sicily . Delrio
740-496: The bridge carried 25.5 million transits a year, with traffic having quadrupled in the previous 30 years and "destined to grow, even in the absence of intervention, by a further 30% in the next 30 years". The study highlighted how the traffic volume, with daily queues at peak hours joining the Autostrada Serravalle , produced "an intense degradation of the bridge structure subjected to considerable stress", with
777-476: The bridge was 7,000 kg (15,000 lb) per tendon, whereas the tendons were originally capable of carrying 15,000 kg (33,000 lb). A single truck can weigh as much as 44,000 kg (97,000 lb). As of the collapse of the bridge, only pillar 11 had been internally inspected in the 1990s, showing severed and oxidized strands. From 1990 onward, the easternmost pillar 11 had its stays strengthened by flanking them with external steel cables. Pillar 10 had
SECTION 20
#1732765464522814-410: The collapse, near the southeastern stay of the subsequently collapsed pillar 9. The crack may have been an indication that the stay had stretched. At no point was a suggestion made to reduce the load on the bridge. Traditionally, bridges were designed for a 50-year lifespan; the bridge failed just under 51 years after its opening. On 3 May 2018, the Autostrade company had announced a call for tenders for
851-509: The loads. In 2017, Carmelo Gentile and Antonello Ruccolo of the Polytechnic University of Milan studied the modal frequencies and deformations of the stays of the bridge. On pillar 9, they could identify only four global modes, and the deformations of two of these identified modes were not fully compliant. Modal frequencies were more than 10% different, specifically on the southern stays. In pre-stressed concrete beams, such
888-550: The mayor of Reggio Emilia for the Unione Party. He was the president of national association of Italian municipalities until July 2013 when the mayor of Turin , Piero Fassino , was elected to the post. On 28 April 2013, Delrio was appointed minister for regional affairs and autonomy to the cabinet led by the Prime Minister Enrico Letta . On 22 February 2014, he was appointed state secretary to
925-416: The need for continuous maintenance. The study showed that, in the option for improving what was termed as the "low gutter", it would be more economical to replace the bridge with a new one north of its current location, and then to demolish the existing bridge. On 14 August 2018, around 11:36 local time (09:36 UTC ), during a torrential rainstorm, the span around pillar 9 of the Ponte Morandi collapsed and
962-441: The removal of all traces of rust on the exposure of the reinforcements, to fill the patches, with epoxidic style resins , and finally to cover everything up with elastomers of very high chemical resistance". In the 1990s, the tendons (the steel wires, cables, and threaded bars, designed to produce the bridge's prestressed concrete ) on pillar 11 appeared to be most damaged. About 30% of the tendons had corroded away. The load of
999-415: The replacement began on 25 June 2019, and it was completed in the spring of 2020. The Genoa-Saint George Bridge was inaugurated on 3 August 2020. Viaduct A viaduct is a specific type of bridge that consists of a series of arches, piers or columns supporting a long elevated railway or road. Typically a viaduct connects two points of roughly equal elevation, allowing direct overpass across
1036-585: The state secretary to Prime Minister Matteo Renzi . He was minister for regional affairs and autonomy from 28 April 2013 to 22 February 2014 as part of the Letta Cabinet . He also served as the mayor of Reggio Emilia . Graziano Delrio was born in Reggio nell'Emilia on 27 April 1960, he is married and has nine children. He holds a degree in medicine and studied in the UK and Israel . His specialization
1073-538: The stays at the top strengthened with steel sheathing in the 1990s. Following the collapse, many questions have been raised about the stays. Morandi's similar bridge in Venezuela suffered one or more stay cable failures in 1979/1980, with collapse imminent. The minister of infrastructures and transport in charge until 1 June 2018, Graziano Delrio , was informed multiple times in the Italian parliament during 2016 that
1110-410: The tendons, could impact the resonant frequency. The effects would be reduced by the composite nature of the stays when observing global modes. Gentile had performed similar modal analyses on pillar 11 in the 1990s. Other related methods were applied on the stays of Ponte Morandi in the 1990s, such as reflectometry, which was able to measure the tension, but not strength of the tendons. By the mid-2000s,
1147-404: The top ends of two pairs of diagonal stay cables . The viaduct was officially opened on 4 September 1967 in the presence of Italian President Giuseppe Saragat . The bridge had been subject to continual restoration work from the 1970s due to an incorrect initial assessment of the effects of creep of the concrete. This resulted in excessive deferred displacement of the vehicle deck so that it
Ponte Morandi - Misplaced Pages Continue
1184-564: The traffic load, necessitating a viaduct for "through" traffic. Such bridges also lend themselves for use by rail traffic, which requires straighter and flatter routes. Some viaducts have more than one deck, such that one deck has vehicular traffic and another deck carries rail traffic. One example of this is the Prince Edward Viaduct in Toronto, Canada, that carries motor traffic on the top deck as Bloor Street , and metro as
1221-445: The train traffic. Likewise, some viaducts carry railroads over large valleys, or they carry railroads over cities with many cross-streets and avenues. Many viaducts over land connect points of similar height in a landscape, usually by bridging a river valley or other eroded opening in an otherwise flat area. Often such valleys had roads descending either side (with a small bridge over the river, where necessary) that become inadequate for
1258-601: The vehicles on it fell into the Polcevera river. Forty-three people were confirmed dead and 16 injured. The disaster caused a major political controversy about the poor state of infrastructure in Italy and raised wider questions about the condition of bridges across Europe. It was later decided that the bridge would not be repaired, but demolished. Demolition began in February 2019 and was completed on 28 June 2019. Construction on
1295-423: Was inaugurated a year later. Ponte Morandi was designed by civil engineer Riccardo Morandi , from whom its unofficial name was derived. It was a cable-stayed bridge characterised by a prestressed concrete structure for the piers , pylons and deck , very few stays , as few as two per span, and a hybrid system for the stays constructed from steel cables with prestressed concrete shells poured on. The concrete
1332-406: Was neither level nor flat; at the worst points, it undulated in all three dimensions. Only after continual measurement, redesign, and associated structural work was the vehicle deck considered acceptable, approaching horizontal by the mid-1980s. In a 1979 report, Morandi himself said "I think [sic] that sooner or later, maybe in a few years, it will be necessary to resort to a treatment consisting of
1369-730: Was prestressed only to 10 MPa (1,500 psi), making it susceptible to cracks, water intrusion, and corrosion of the internal steel. The bridge was similar to Morandi's earlier 1957 design for the General Rafael Urdaneta Bridge in Venezuela except for the stays, which on the Venezuelan bridge are not covered with prestressed concrete. The viaduct was built between 1963 and 1967 by the Società Italiana per Condotte d'Acqua , costing 3.8 billion Italian lire and opened on 4 September 1967. It had
#521478