Holger Svensson

Helgeland Bridge, Norway, completed in 1991

Holger S. Svensson (* 1945 in Geesthacht ) is a German civil engineer ( bridge construction , especially cable-stayed bridges ).

biography

Svensson's grandfather was Swede and came to Geesthacht in 1867 as an employee of the Dynamit Nobel company . His father was first in the protection force in German South West Africa and then worked internationally as a businessman (New York, Guatemala) before opening a building materials store in Geesthacht. From 1964 he studied civil engineering at the Technical University of Stuttgart with a diploma in 1969. Fritz Leonhardt was one of his teachers, but he rarely gave lectures himself, but the students learned about solid construction from his extensive script. From 1970 to 1971 he worked, mediated by Fritz Leonhardt, for the construction company Grinaker in South Africa (based in Johannesburg ) and Botswana (an engineer from Grinaker was on an exchange with Leonhardt und Partner for a year in Stuttgart) and from 1972 he was with the engineering office Leonhardt , Andrä und Partner (LAP) in Stuttgart , where he was managing partner in 1992, commercial director in 1993 and management spokesman from 1998 to 2008. From 2003 to 2008 he headed the main branch in Stuttgart. Since 2010 he has been an independent consulting engineer and honorary professor at the TU Dresden (teaching assignment for cable-stayed bridges).

At LAP he mainly dealt with the design and testing of large bridges and especially cable-stayed bridges. From 1974 to 1990 he only worked on bridges abroad.

Projects (selection)

• Pasco-Kennewick Bridge , designed with Leonhardt, the first large cable-stayed bridge in the USA (opened 1978), which the Federal Highway Administration was very interested in introducing in the USA. At that time the world record for concrete girder cable-stayed bridges with a span of 300 m. Svensson was the project manager.
• East Huntington Bridge , draft
• Sunshine Skyway Bridge , draft
• East End Bridge
• Talmadge Memorial Bridge over the Savannah River , draft
• Burlington Bridge over the Mississippi River , draft
• Baytown Bridge ( Fred Hartman Bridge , Houston Ship Channel), draft
• Concrete approach bridge of the Fleher Bridge , detail processing
• Neckar valley bridge Weitingen , draft processing
• Design: Wilsdruff and Siebenlehn bridges on the A4, Warnowbrücke on the A 20, Neukölln motorway triangle with arched bridge on the A 113
• Examination of the Kochertal bridge
• Helgeland Bridge , draft
• Advice on the design of the Leven River Bridge over the Leven
• Execution planning of the Savebrücke over the Ada Ciganlija
• World Bank appraiser for the Yangpu Bridge
• Review of the Penang Bridge
• Test engineer at Högakustenbron , Uddevallabron (Sunningesund), Umeälvsbron and Svinesund Bridge in Sweden.
• Exam Golden Ears Bridge ,
• Examination of the Pelješac Bridge

Honors

• In 1995 he gave the Annual Lecture at the Henderson Colloquium of the IABSE (20 Years' Experience with Cable-stayed bridges).
• 1999 James Watt Medal, Institution of Civil Engineers, London
• 2000 Henry Husband Prize, Institution of Structural Engineers, London
• 2011 Emil-Mörsch-Denkmünze, German Concrete and Construction Technology Association EV, Berlin
• 2012 ICARO Award from the University of La Coruna, Spain
• 2013 honorary member of the IABSE , of which he was Vice President from 2003 to 2011.

He was a member of the jury for the German Bridge Construction Award, the Civil Engineering Award and the German Steel Construction Engineering Award.

literature

• Autobiographical entry in: Klaus Stiglat : Bauingenieure und ihr Werk , Ernst and Son 2004, p. 404ff
• Jürgen Stritzke ; Richard Stroetmann: Holger Svensson 70 years . In: Stahlbau, Vol. 84 (2015), no. 2, pp. 155–156.

Fonts

• Cable-stayed bridges - 40 years of experience worldwide, Ernst and Son 2011 (English edition 2012 by Wiley-Blackwell)

Web links

• Website at TU Dresden

Remarks

1. ^ IABSE, Annual Lecture
2. ↑ It also contains autobiographical information and his own experience in building bridges and about his collaboration with Leonhardt