ESWP recognizes rail bridges in awards program for first time

American Society of Engineers praises railroad infrastructure.

The International Bridge Conference (IBC), a product of the Engineers’ Society of Western Pennsylvania, has been honoring achievements in bridge engineering for years through its bridge medals. The medals—Roebling, Richardson, Lindenthal, Figg, Hayden, and Lichtenstein—recognize bridge projects that overcome unique challenges and serve their communities in the best way possible.

For the first time in the program’s history, IBC will be handing out an Award of Merit, sponsored by Railway Track & Structures magazine, to a heavy/light-rail bridge project. This year’s winner is the Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge in Nanjing, Jiangsu, China.

The IBC Awards Committee lists the following highlights of the Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge rehabilitation project:

• Double-deck railway and highway bridge designed and built by China in 1968;
• Selected into the first batch of China’s 20^th century architectural heritage list;
• Innovation and creativity were employed to delicately restore all cultural and visual aspects of the original bridge;
• Preservation included improving member capacity using self-consolidating concrete and LS concrete; installation of galvanic anodes; replacing the concrete bridge deck with an orthotropic bridge deck; manufactured using factory robots, 3-D scanning and reconstruction technology to restore defective members; and using solid-state electromagnetic induction heating to replace rusted rivets.

The recipients of the 2020 bridge medals will be recognized during the IBC’s virtual conference Oct. 19-23.

Read more articles on rail bridge projects.