Gustave Bridel

Gustave Bridel around 1880

Gustave Albert Bridel (born October 26, 1827 in Biel , † December 3, 1884 in Bern ) was a Swiss engineer , responsible for a number of important buildings in France and Switzerland.

Among the most important technical works in Switzerland in the 19th century are the Jura waters correction, the Bernese Jura Railway and the Gotthard Railway . Bridel was at the forefront of technical management for these three structures during the most responsible periods.

Life

After his youth in Biel in the early baroque Palais Rockhall (today the director of the Biel Engineering School), he spent his school days in Biel and Geneva. In 1844 he went to Paris, where he was accepted into the famous engineering school École Centrale Paris and graduated as a mechanical engineer at the age of 20 with the title “Type de la régularité, de l'ordre, de l'intelligence et du travail. Nature remarquable sous tous les rapports pendant son séjour à l'Ecole “.

Gustave Bridel died of a stomach ailment in Bern on December 3, 1884, leaving behind three children (including Gustav Bridel, who later became head of the artillery weapons division) and his wife Marie-Louise Bridel-Carrel. In his memory, the Gustave-Bridel-Weg was marked in Biel and there is the Bridel-Strasse in Bern.

Professional background

After participating in various railway projects, he was given the job of building the “ Palais de l'Industrie ” with the associated ancillary structures for the 1855 World's Fair on the Champs Elysées in Paris. Construction and technology are comprehensively described in the work “Le Palais de l'Industrie et ses Annexes”, written by Alexis Barrault and Gustave Bridel.

In 1856, the former professor and director of the “Ecole centrale” and a relative of Bridel's, Auguste Perdonnet, published a two-volume work entitled “Traité élémentaire des chemins de fer”, which was extraordinarily extensive for the time. It was the first standard work on the continent on the technology of the railways.

In 1857 Gustave Bridel returned to Switzerland and opened an engineering office in Yverdon. He worked in bridge building, u. a. on the Vaumarcus – Lausanne – St. Maurice and the viaduct over the Orbe near Vallorbe, approx. 60 m above the river bed, with a total length of 160 m and a span of 56 m, the largest of the three lattice girders.

From 1868 to 1873 he headed the first large Jura water correction ( Riccardo La Nicca ) with the main work of the Hagneck Canal (breakthrough into Lake Biel). This was preceded by intensive political efforts to secure the implementation of the work.

From 1873 to 1879 Gustave Bridel was in charge of the construction of the Bernese Jura Railway . A number of technical difficulties had to be overcome, particularly when building the tunnels.

Already at this time Gustave Bridel was asked for advice on the construction of the Gotthard Railway , as more and more difficulties became apparent there. In 1879, after repeated inquiries from politicians and the Gotthard Railway Company, he decided to take over the post of chief engineer from chief engineer Wilhelm Hellwag . The situation was particularly critical with the Gotthard tunnel and right from the start he had to undertake the reconstruction of two pressure sections with deformation of the tunnel profile (under Andermatt, 2800 m and centrally at 7500 m) on his own. The previous construction method showed a cavity between the wall and the rock, which was filled with rubble. From the work of Felix Moeschlin (2, p. 462) one takes: "Bridel keeps coming back to the fact that the mountains with their all-round pressure must be viewed as a liquid". Dr. Stapf and the control engineer join. All other authorities of the railway company and the Louis Favre company disagreed. He now made use of his right of appeal to the Federal Council, which gave him the right. With this in mind, Bridel wished to take full responsibility. He suggested that the Favre company do the second reconstruction on both printing sections and carry it out themselves with his engineers. The company finally agreed. Under his direction, the work was carried out and the damage repaired, the masonry still holds today. Boreholes in 1944 showed that the tunnel ridge lies only around 30 meters below the valley floor, which is filled with rubble. This was the reason for the destructive pressure on the tunnel.

The project for the early electrification of the Gotthard tunnel from 1881 to 82 almost marked a world premiere: Gustave Bridel worked with Siemens to investigate the installation of electrical rail operations. The last letter from Bridel to Siemens ended with the following text: "... Above all, of course, a binding offer for the construction of the test system would be convened for me and I would consider myself lucky if the task could be thoroughly solved in this way". For reasons unknown, the proposals were not followed up. The line was not electrified until 1920. On May 22, 1882, a month earlier than promised, the official opening ceremony of the Gotthard Railway took place.

After Bridel had successfully built the Gotthard Railway, he took on the position of director of the Jura-Bern-Lucerne Railway. He took up this position on March 1, 1883, which appealed to him all the more since a large number of his colleagues belonged to his circle of friends. In the time remaining free in addition to his administrative work, he devoted himself to expert opinions and arbitration tribunals, for which he received orders from home and abroad. In addition, he was elected by the Federal Council as a member of the Swiss School Council, the supervisory authority of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich.

literature

• Alexis Barrault, Gustave Bridel: Le Palais de l´Industrie et ses Annexes. E. Noblet, Editeur, Paris and Liège 1857. ("Dédié à SAI le Prince Napoléon", with 27 steel engravings)
• Auguste Perdonnet: Traité élémentaire des chemins de fer. Paris, Langlois Editeur, Paris 1856.
• G. Dolezalek: The expansion of the Gotthard tunnel. Extra print from the journal of the Architects and Engineers Association of Hanover , Volume XXVIII, 1882.
• Gustave Bridel: Tunnel with mechanical alignment gallery drilling. Appropriateness of the ridge tunnel or sole tunnel operation. Meyer / Keller, Lucerne 1883.
• G. Bridel: Examen critique des systèmes d'exécution appliqués à la construction rapide des grands tunnels. Meyer / Keller, Lucerne 1883.
• Werner Bourquin: Gustav Bridel of Biel. In: Bieler Tagblatt. August 26, 1932.
• Ernst Mathys: Contributions to Swiss railway history. Self-published, Bern 1944.
• Ernst Mathys Felix: Men of the Rail. Self-published, Bern 1947.
• Felix Moeschlin: We are drilling through the Gotthard. Volumes 1 & 2, Gutenberg Book Guild, Zurich 1947.
• Gustave Bridel: Engineer Gustave Bridel (1827-1884). Reprint from the Bern journal for history and local history. Bern 1952/2.
• W. Trüb: 1882 - electrically through the Gotthard tunnel? SBB Nachrichtenblatt, magazine for the staff of the Swiss Federal Railways. 4/1977.
• Georges Bridel, Gustave Bridel: Alpine Railway. Engineers, Swiss pioneers in business and technology. Association for Economic History Studies, Meilen 2001.

Web links

• Christoph Zürcher: Bridel, Gustave. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
• Publications by and about Gustave Bridel in the Helveticat catalog of the Swiss National Library