Civil Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
FIGURE 1.16
The St. Lawrence Bridge built in 1886 at Montreal, Canada. (From Canadian
Pacific Archives NS.1151, photograph by J.W. Heckman. With permission.)
trussed arch bridge in New York. It was built to carry four heavily loaded railroad
tracks of the New England Connecting Railroad and Pennsylvania Railroad when it
was completed in 1916 (
Figure 1.17)
.
It is the largest arch bridge in the world and
was erected without the use of falsework. It was also the first major bridge to use
high carbon steel members in its construction.
∗
The Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad
completed construction of two 775 ft span continuous steel trusses across the Ohio
River at Sciotoville, Ohio, in 1917. This bridge remains the largest continuous span
bridge in the world.
It has been estimated that in 1910 there were 80,000 iron and steel bridges
†
with a
cumulative length of 1400 miles on about 190,000 miles of track. Railroads were the
catalyst for material and construction technology innovation in the latter half of the
nineteenth century as the transition from wood and masonry to iron and steel bridges
occurred in conjunction with construction methods that minimized interference with
rail and other traffic.
‡
The art and science of bridge engineering was emerging from
∗
Primarily, due to the high cost of alloy steel.
†
The majority being steel by the beginning of the twentieth century.
‡
For example, in order to not interfere with railway traffic, the tubular spans of the Victoria Bridge at
Montreal were replaced by extension of substructures and erecting steel trusses around the exterior of
the tubular girders.
