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Ingenious Berri Bridge

The town of Berri, some two hundred kilometres north-east of Adelaide, will never be the same following the completion of a new bridge across the Murray River.

Berri Berri BridgeThe bridge provides a convenient crossing and replaces a ferry service which had been in operation for over 70 years. Gone are the frustrating days when the crossing could take up to 45 minutes during peak traffic times.

The realisation of this bridge is an example of what can be achieved with the close cooperation of enterprising private industry and government, coupled with innovative engineering. Built Environs and Connell Wagner prepared the proposal in close consultation with the Department of Road Transport, local townspeople and the Aboriginal community, who owned some of the land on the Loxton side of the river. BlueScope Steel also played an important role, supplying the steel plate and advising on parts of the design.

The bridge was completed on budget and ahead of time, despite delays due to high floods. It also won the coveted Institution of Engineers Excellence Award (South Australia), with Built Environs and Connell Wagner, the design consultant, being joint recipients of the award.

Pier innovation

A significant innovation was necessary during the design of the bridge, to accommodate some essential safety requirements. The Department of Road Transport, South Australia required all the bridge piers to be able to withstand the impact of a 1 760 tonne vessel moving at four knots, with a current in the river moving at about one metre per second.

Connell Wagner recognised that the construction cost of the five river piers for this loading was prohibitive. They proposed the concept of 'pier redundancy' for the steel girder option. This meant that, if any pier was removed, the bridge would not collapse and continue to provide a limited service.

"The steel option is the only one suited to this concept because of its lightness and ductility", said Vic Nechvoglod, designer for Connell Wagner. "The superstructure has the overload capacity to carry limited one-way traffic on the centreline of the bridge with any one of the river piers removed. I believe this is the first bridge in the world to be designed in this way."

Spirit of cooperation

The spirit of cooperation achieved on this project is exemplified by the positive involvement of the local people and the Aboriginal community, who celebrated by painting a huge mural under the Berri abutment. The painting is set to become a historic landmark and a popular tourist attraction.

BlueScope Steel Market Development Manager, Frank Rapattoni said the teamwork that built this ingenious bridge and joined the communities in Loxton and Berri was impressive.

"This project is outstanding not only because of the clever innovations which have set important precedents, but because the key stakeholders were able to accept the challenges and work together as a team to make it a reality. Acceptance of innovations on any project is always difficult, due to the reluctance of stakeholders to take any risk. In this case everyone benefited from a more entrepreneurial approach.”

If you are planning to build a bridge and would like to explore what steel can do for you, contact BlueScope Steel.

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