Niagara Cantilever Bridge
Coordinates: 43 ° 6 ′ 29 " N , 79 ° 3 ′ 29" W
| Niagara Cantilever Bridge | ||
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| Official name | Michigan Central Railway Cantilever Bridge | |
| use | railroad | |
| Convicted | Michigan Central Railroad / Canada Southern Railway and successor | |
| Crossing of | Niagara Gorge | |
| place | Niagara Falls (New York) / Clifton later Niagara Falls (Ontario) | |
| construction | Cantilever bridge | |
| overall length | 276 m | |
| Longest span | 151 m | |
| Clear height | approx. 60 m | |
| building-costs | $ 700,000 | |
| start of building | April 15, 1883 | |
| completion | December 1, 1883 | |
| opening | December 20, 1883 | |
| planner | Charles Conrad Schneider | |
| closure | 1925 | |
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The Niagara Cantilever Bridge or Michigan Central Railway Cantilever Bridge was a cantilever bridge over the Niagara Gorge . As an international railway bridge between Canada and the United States , it connected the American city of Niagara Falls in the American state of New York and the Canadian town of Clifton , which from 1903 became part of the newly founded Canadian city of Niagara Falls in the Canadian province of Ontario . In 1883 the bridge was opened to traffic. It was located south of the then Niagara Falls Suspension Bridge (which was later replaced by the Whirlpool Rapids Bridge ( Lower Arch Bridge )). In 1925, the Niagara Cantilever Bridge was replaced by the Michigan Central Railway Bridge .
background
Although British engineers suggested as early as 1846 that the Gerber girder should be used as a replacement for statically unspecified structures, the first modern cantilever bridge that was actually built was Heinrich Gottfried Gerber's Haßfurter Bridge over the Main from 1867 with a span of 38 m.
The next important cantilever bridge was the High Bridge , built by American engineer Charles Shaler Smith ten years later. It represented the first practical test of the application of the tanner girder to the construction of long bridges. This to date longest bridge of this type led the Cincinnati Southern Railway over a 366 m wide and 84 m deep canyon of the Kentucky River near Dixville .
The Michigan Central Railway Cantilever Bridge and the almost identical Fraser River Bridge in British Columbia sparked engineering interest in this new type of construction. They were the prototypes for the Forth Bridge in Scotland , the Poughkeepsie Bridge over the Hudson River in New York, the Young's High Bridge over the Kentucky River, the Frisco Bridge over the Mississippi, and the Québec Bridge .
Building history
The Michigan Central Railway Cantilever Bridge was a project by the financier and railroad pioneer Cornelius Vanderbilt . Vanderbilt needed a rail link between Canada and the United States, but was unwilling to pay the high rent for using the Lower Arch Bridge. He owned the Michigan Central Railroad and was keen to take control of the Canada Southern Railway as well.
Vanderbilt decided to build a new bridge. To this end, he founded the Niagara River Bridge Company and was commissioned by the Canadian and US authorities to carry out the construction.
On April 9, 1883 , the company signed a contract with the Central Bridge Works Company in Buffalo . Chief engineer was Charles Conrad Schneider , the engineer Edmund Hayes directed the construction, which began on April 15th of the same year. November 1st was planned as the completion date. For every day that the execution took moreover, had a penalty of 500 USD to be paid.
The pillars were completed on October 11th. The company soon realized that it would not be possible to complete the bridge and tracks on the scheduled date. A three-foot advance on each side was assumed every two days, and five days to join the center piece. On November 18th, all the beams were installed.
On November 21, the press reported that the bridge was completed and will link Canada and the United States. The official completion date was December 1, 1883. The bridge had cost US $ 700,000 . The first crossing of the bridge took place on December 6th at 11:41 am. The train consisted of the locomotive with tender and a passenger car in which important people sat. A stress test with two heavy freight trains passing the bridge at the same time and the festive inauguration took place on December 20th.
After the new Michigan Central Railway Steel Arch Bridge went into operation in 1925, the Niagara Cantilever Bridge was demolished and the material sold as scrap.
Schneider's bridge had a useful life of more than 40 years, at a time when train traffic was increasing rapidly. Due to the speed at which this bridge was built using a new construction method and its long service life, it was one of the most advanced bridges in the world at the time of construction.
construction
The pillars were 40.3 m high, the girders each 99 m long and 7.9 m high at the anchorage. Each of the two ends of the bridge consisted of a steel part that had to reach from one side of the river almost to the middle of the gorge. The outriggers were each supported by a steel pillar near their center point, from which two support arms extended: one that reached the bank, while the other protruded 53 m into the gorge. Since the outer arms had no support and were just as exposed to the weight of the trains as the arms on the bank, they had to be anchored firmly in the rocks on the bank.
The bridge span was 151 m. The ends of the girders spanned 120 m, so that a gap of 37 m was created, which was closed with a suspension girder in the form of an ordinary truss bridge suspended from the ends of the boom. Bearings were built in to allow the bridge to expand and shrink as a result of the temperature.
The bridge had a total length of 276 m. It had two tracks and could carry the weight of two trains that crossed the bridge at the same time. The railroad drove on it 73 m high above the Niagara River.
Web links
photos
- niagara.edu , photo of the construction of the bridge
- niagara.edu , two trains running at the same time
- small picture showing stabilizing ropes
- Crossing the gorge on a high wire on July 17, 1891
- The bridge 1894
- The bridge in front of the Whirlpool Bridge
information
- Niagara Cantilever (in English)
- Niagarafrontier.com (in English)