Hercílio Luz Bridge

The Hercilio Luz Bridge is the first bridge constructed to link the Island of Florianópolis (state of Santa Catarina) with the mainland of Brazil.

It is the longest suspension bridge in Brazil, and many sites claim that is also one of the oldest hanging bridges in the world. The central span was considered quite long (but not the longest, at 340 meters) at the time of its opening and is still one of the 100 largest suspension bridges.

The bridge was designed by the firm of Robinson & Steinman, and completed in 1926 and took ten times its original budget to build. It was named in honour of Hercilio Luz, a former governor of the state of Santa Catarina. The bridge has been closed since 1991.

It has the fairly unusual feature that the truss carrying the roadway (a continuous stiffening component) is above the roadway itself and meets up with the cables making it non uniform in height. A similar bridge, the Walter Taylor Bridge, was built over the Brisbane River in Brisbane, Australia in 1936.[1]

The bridge was built by American Bridge Company, which, perhaps more than any other company in the world, was best qualified to work on a bridge with a continuous stiffening component. The Florianopolis Bridge when built from 1922 to 1926 was the longest eyebar suspension span in existence at that time. The 11 13’-O”-long design features towers with rocker bearings. The company brought to that project its own experimental heat-treated eyebars, and as project contractor pioneered stiffening techniques that saved materials and money while providing greater rigidity.

File:Ponte Hercilio Luz - Dezembro 1996 - by Sérgio Schmiegelow.jpg

External links

• HAER report on the Three Sisters (Pittsburgh) which mentions the ABC and the eyebar features (Page 29) Some article material adapted from this public domain document.

27°35′38″S 48°33′58″W