George Bridge (Meiningen)
Coordinates: 50 ° 34 ′ 2 " N , 10 ° 24 ′ 33" E
| George Bridge | ||
|---|---|---|
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| use | Road bridge | |
| Convicted | Werra | |
| place | Meiningen | |
| construction | Arch bridge | |
| overall length | 63 m | |
| width | 8 m | |
| Longest span | 40 m | |
| start of building | July 1899 | |
| completion | November 1899 | |
| opening | December 22, 1899 | |
| planner | Eduard Fritze | |
| location | ||
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| Above sea level | 295 m | |
The Georgsbrücke in Meiningen spans the Werra river and is considered to be the oldest preserved reinforced concrete bridge in Germany, built according to the "Melan system" . The road bridge connects the city center with the West district. The engineer of the structure was the ducal chief building officer for hydraulic engineering and road construction Eduard Fritze . The original name of the bridge was Herzog-Georg-Brücke - after Duke Georg II of Saxony-Meiningen .
Building
The Georgsbrücke is a reinforced concrete arch bridge with a 40 m span, an arrow height of 3.70 m and a total length of 63 m. Their width is 8 m. The carriageway is 4.60 m wide, flanked on both sides by 1.70 m wide footpaths. The arch construction consists of iron truss girders encased in concrete ("System Melan", after the Austrian civil engineer Joseph Melan ). The foundations are 11.50 m long and 7.50 m wide. The railing was made of limestone thorns in the style of historicism .
To protect the bridge and because of the narrow width of the lane, traffic takes place in a two-way one-way street, controlled by a set of traffic lights. The Georgsbrücke is a listed building .
history
The Georgsbrücke was built in 1899 as the second reinforced concrete bridge in Germany constructed according to the "Melan System". The first bridge of this type was built in Königsberg in East Prussia , but where it collapsed during a stress test.
The engineer Eduard Fritze had the bridge built a few meters downstream next to a former wooden bridge that was destroyed during the heavy Werra flood of November 25, 1890. The construction was carried out by the construction company B. Liebold & Co. based in Holzminden . In order to ensure a high permeability of the new bridge during floods, Fritze placed the bridge foundations on artificially raised embankments. Construction began in July 1899, completed in November 1899, the bridge was handed over to the customer on December 17, 1899. Before that, a stress test was carried out with several carts of oxen overloaded with rocks.
The official opening to traffic took place on December 22, 1899. In 1975 the first maintenance work was carried out. The Georgsbrücke underwent a general renovation from 1988 to 1990 when the Geisa bridge was built .
literature
- Karl Thränhardt, Hartmut Pfannschmidt: Architecture in Meiningen. Resch, Meiningen 2010, ISBN 978-3-940295-08-8 .
- Kuratorium Meiningen (Hrsg.): Lexicon for the history of the city of Meiningen. Bielsteinverlag, Meiningen 2008, ISBN 978-3-9809504-4-2 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Architecture in Meiningen , page 8.
- ↑ a b c d Anonymous: From the industrial and art exhibition in Düsseldorf 1902. In: Deutsche Bauzeitung , XXXVI. Vintage, N °. 68 of 23 August 1902, p. 437 ( digitized on opus4.kobv.de)
- ↑ a b c Lexicon on the history of the town of Meiningen , page 88.
- ↑ Older bridges constructed according to the "Monierbau system" with iron inserts were e.g. B. the Ludwig-Ferdinand-Brücke (1892) and the Gerner Brücke (1897) over the Nymphenburger Schlosskanal and the Kabelsteg (1898) over the Isar in Munich.
- ^ Architecture in Meiningen , page 10.