Fulton Street Bridge, Cleveland, Ohio

Submitted by Jeff Buster on Tue, 04/21/2009 - 10:07.
Fulton Street Bridge, Cleveland, Ohio

fulton street bridge cleveland ohio Kokosing Construction precast concrete post tensioned arched bridgeVery sophisticated, time consuming, and expensive bridge construction.  I give both the precast and cast in place workmanship a high mark.  Kokosing has good QA on this job. 

A lot of expense is in the falsework - for example the temporary steel shores which are in the left hand bay to accept the "Key" stone center precast section.   A temporary bridge had to be built over Big Creek to provide access for the cranes to the westerly sections of the Fulton bridge.

This bridge will mirror the historic cast in place conrete bridge which was removed - and aesthetically this may be important over the Metroparks Zoo - but at a considerable dollar cost.

Photos 4.19.09

There are many high tech field applied critical details in this construction system - the following photo shows the post tensioning cable puller (silver cylinder on deck with multiple cable holes) and hydraulic power pack on a temporary personel platform. After the cable bundles (coming out of the black lipped tubes and wrapped in poly)  are tensioned and locked down the next step is to pressure grout the cable tube which runs from tower to tower through the 3 precast arched concrete sections. You can read more about post tensioning on Wikipedia

 post tensioning pump and cable vice fulton road bridge kokosing construction

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NEO historic bridge

Submitted by None on Thu, 09/10/2009 - 15:00.

This $45,859,138.00 project required the replacement of the six-span, open-spandrel, arch bridge which overlooks the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo and spans a historic bridge, two railroad tracks, and several maintenance roads and foot paths. The presence of rail tracks, roads, paths, and in particular, the maintenance of the historic bridge, made site navigation, set-up and construction a real challenge.

In an effort to, “Do what it takes to do the job,” Kokosing purchased a 300-ton Liebherr crane specifically to handle the challenges. The new structure is an 11-span, pre-cast, open-spandrel, arch bridge. Nearly 1,800 cubic yards of self-leveling mass concrete are contained in the bridge piers. These seven piers were post-tensioned to support the pre-cast arches, which were erected in segments on shoring towers and then post-tensioned as well. Following the erection of the arches, the spandrel columns and caps were poured. Pre-cast concrete beams were also erected to support the bridge deck.

Additionally, all approach work, including storm sewer, water line, MSE wall, pre-cast lagging retaining wall and concrete pavement construction was self-performed by Kokosing.

Link to an artist rendering of new bridge.

The bridge is not finished, but nearly. 

Photo of deck work as of July 2009:

bridge replacement alternatives put practical limitations on feasible replacement types. With the goal in mind of replacing the Fulton Road Bridge ...

The bridge will be opened in either late Fall 2009 or the Spring of 2010.  

 

 

 

The original bridge was constructed in 1932 at a cost of $1.1 million.

It was 1,560 ft. (475 m) long, 76 ft. (23 m) wide, and rose 110 ft. (33.5 m) above Big Creek Valley. The cantilevered sidewalk, rails and lighting portions were removed during the 1980s emergency repairs, leaving it only 65 ft. (19.8 m) wide.

The new bridge will be 1,583 ft. (482 m) long, 81 ft. (24.6 m) wide, and will stand 110 ft. above the Cleveland MetroParks Zoo and Big Creek Reservation. It will carry four lanes of traffic, two 5-ft. wide (1.5 m) bike lanes, and two 10-ft. (3 m) wide sidewalks. There will be six main arch spans of 210 ft. (64 m) each, with a similar look as the original arch spans.

Besides the sidewalks and bike paths, additional features will include high and low level lighting, an overlook near the center of the bridge and an all purpose trail beneath the bridge, to allow for access into the Cleveland MetroParks Big Creek Reservation

“This is one of the few structures that may be more visible by traffic beneath the bridge than those traveling on it,” said Bencivengo. The zoo’s attendance exceeds one million visitors a year with primary access points crossing under the bridge. “It was important for all of the project’s stakeholders to work together to maintain the look and feel of the old bridge.