Suspended over the Blue Danube...
THE BRIDGE OVER THE DANUBE RIVER, BRĂILA, ROMANIA
The first drops of Europe's second longest river (the longest of the EU) gush from a small spring located in the abundant Black Forest in Germany: 2,858 km, 10 Countries and 4 capitals crossed, with an average water flow of 6,500 cubic metres per second. Its incessant journey terminates among the waves of the Black Sea, with a delta (UNESCO World Heritage) that extends on the border between Ukraine and Romania. Johann Strauss dedicated a Waltz in D Major to it, the most famous one, entitled "The Blue Danube" ("An der schönen blauen Donau"), one of the most listened to classical pieces. It is not the only record connected to these fresh, cold waters that in Brăila, Romania, are crossed by continental Europe's second longest suspended bridge, and Romania's first.
The bridge was completed between 2018 and 2023. It measures 1,975 metres in length and is 31.7 metres wide. It stands at 38 metres from the maximum flooding level of the Danube. It includes 4 lanes, emergency lanes, bike and pedestrian paths.
Its two towers measure 192.64 metres in height, allowing it to win the AICAP Prize for the best project in structural concrete. It is from these towers that the 2 main cables supporting the deck begin their journey (1,120 metres for the central span, plus 489.65 metres and 364.65 metres for the lateral ones), with an intertwining of over 18,000 steel wires (approximately 9,000 for each cable), for an overall weight of 6,775 tonnes. If we unwound them all and put them in line, one after the other, we would reach an overall length of 38,000 km, approximately a tenth of the distance that separates Earth from the Moon.
Before its inauguration, the only way a person could go from the Brăila coast to the Jijila one was by ferryboat. It is still possible to take the ferryboat, but to take a more romantic cruise to discover the river that made its way through the Carpathian Mounts, bewitching Count Dracula himself.
THE WORK AND THE TECHNIQUE
DIRECT AND INDIRECT WORKERS SINCE WORKS BEGAN
M3 CONCRETE
T STEEL
M TOTAL LENGTH OF THE SUSPENDED BRIDGE
M LENGTH OF MAIN SPAN
KM TOTAL LENGTH OF STEEL CABLES TO SUPPORT STRUCTURES
Compania Nationala de Administrare a Infrastructurii Rutiere for the Romanian Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure
Joint Venture led by the Webuild Group (60%) with IHI Infrastructure Systems Co. Ltd
The Bridge over the Danube River is a complex, sustainable work. The ambitious project, the type of soil and the medium seismic level of the area, required adopting special construction techniques, like using piles with a large diameter for the foundations, excavating extended and deep shafts, besides using innovative plants to extract water from the underground aquifers.
CULTURAL INSIGHTS
Quicker, growing transport
The Bridge over the Danube River connects two sides of one of the main ramifications of the delta of the Danube, near the Romanian cities of Brăila and Galati. Respectively, Romania's eleventh and eight most populated, with 155 thousand and 218 thousand residents in 2021, these two cities have a metropolitan area that nears 500,000 people, still very much growing.
Building the bridge allowed to drastically cut the time needed to cross the river: in fact, previously it took 50 minutes of ferryboat (also considering the times needed for vehicles to get on and off the ferry). While today, it only requires 2 minutes by car. Consequently, the userbase of this infrastructure will also have a huge growth margin: from the historical 7,000 vehicles transported daily by ferry, an estimate showed a first increase of up to 11,400 vehicles per day. Transport for work, tourist and commercial purposes will be benefited by this. Also, the Romanian South-East connections will grow, easing and speeding up the area's residents' access to public, commercial and sanitary services equally re-distributed in a territory that is finally united.
In particular, from 2019 to 2023, lorries represented approximately 16.5% of the total traffic of Romanian roads, highlighting that infrastructural development can not only benefit private and public transport, but especially trade logistics. Moreover, considering that the area is very near to the Moldavian border and to Ukraine's (which are just less than 1 hour's drive from Brăila), developing better and quicker road connections is increasing the dimension of trade flows between these three nations. In 2023, Romania was in fact the main trade partner of Moldavia of which it is the first importing nation and the recipient of the export of goods and food), and the second when it comes to Ukrainian export.
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