Rudolphstein bridge
Coordinates: 50 ° 24 ′ 59 ″ N , 11 ° 46 ′ 59 ″ E
 Rudolphstein bridge
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| Official name | Bridge of German Unity | |
| Convicted | Federal motorway 9 | |
| Subjugated | Saale | |
| place | Rudolphstein , Lehesten | |
| construction | Vault bridge / plate bridge | |
| overall length | 254 m / 296.4 m | |
| width | 22.2 m / 18.15 m | |
| Longest span | 31.2 m | |
| height | 35 m | |
| building-costs | 3 million RM / 14 million DM |
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| completion | 1936/1996 | |
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The Saalebrücke Rudolphstein or Bridge of German Unity is a structure on the Federal Motorway 9 (Berlin - Munich) that spans the Saale near Rudolphstein , which forms the Thuringian - Bavarian border here.
The listed building consists of three parallel bridges and stands between the connection points Bad Lobenstein and Rudolphstein. The vault bridge was opened to traffic for the first time on September 27, 1936 and was one of the well-known large bridges of the motorway construction program of the Nazi era . It was the model for many similar bridges.
Bridge structures
Bridge from 1936
The viaduct was built within one year by an average of 300 workers at a construction cost of around three million Reichsmarks (this would correspond to a current purchasing power of around 13.1 million euros). The architectural design was the responsibility of Oberreichsbahnrat Fritz Limpert, and Paul Bonatz acted as advisor . Each directional carriageway was supported by its own 9.05 m wide vaulted bridge . The clear distance in the transverse direction between the bridges is 3.0 m. In the longitudinal direction, the 254 m long structure has eight openings with semicircular arches with a clearance of 27 m each . The pillar spacing is 31.2 m. The visible surfaces of the masonry construction are clad with granite . A bastion-like extension was created at the north-western end of the bridge, which served as a resting place and viewing platform to the Saale valley. A pylon with a sovereign eagle and swastika stood on the platform. A postage stamp from the Modern Buildings series of the Deutsche Reichspost for the Winter Relief Organization in 1936 had the bridge as its motif, as did an advertising poster for the Reichsautobahn.
Towards the end of the Second World War , on April 13, 1945, the bridge was badly damaged by German troops after a pier was blown up. It was impassable for the next 21 years. It was only through a contract between the Federal Republic of Germany and the GDR in 1964 that the building was repaired for 5.5 million DM (adjusted for inflation today, around 11.5 million euros) and opened to traffic again at Christmas 1966. Until then, the transit motorway to Berlin between the Schleizer Dreieck (GDR) and the Berg / Bad Steben (Bavaria) motorway exit was closed. A section of the B 2 or F 2 with the Töpen / Juchhöh border control point was used for interzonal traffic between Hof and the Schleizer Dreieck . In 1987, the concrete road surface and the bridge waterproofing were renewed for 8.2 million DM (today, adjusted for inflation, corresponds to around 7.5 million euros).
As part of the six-lane expansion of the motorway ( traffic project German Unity No. 12 ), a new prestressed concrete bridge was built between April 1994 and April 1996 next to the old structure for the Berlin lane. This was followed in 1996 by the replacement of the carriageway slab at the old vault bridge with construction costs of 7.7 million DM (corresponds to around 5.4 million euros adjusted for inflation today).
Bridge from 1996
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The new eastern bridge is a ten- span , 296.4 m long prestressed concrete structure with spans of 23.4 m in the peripheral fields and 31.2 m in the inner fields, which corresponds to the opening rhythm of the old bridge. The structure has a solid in-situ concrete slab with a maximum thickness of 1.62 m in the middle and 40 cm at the edge. The superstructure is supported by individual pillars arranged in the middle of the bridge's longitudinal axis. The octagonal pillars have an accessible reinforced concrete hollow cross-section with a total width of 2.7 m below the pillar head. The pillars are widened in two steps like a trumpet. After a height of 4.0 m there is a width of 6.30 m. Four deformation bearings are arranged in this plane . The following upper widening up to the superstructure plate has a height of approx. 1.6 m with a maximum diameter of 10.7 m.
The abutments and four pillars near the hall are founded on bored piles with a diameter of 1.5 m. The remaining pillars have a flat foundation .
The in-situ concrete slab of the superstructure was produced in sections with around 700 m³ of concrete at lengths of approx. 31 m on falsework . The bridge cost 14 million DM (corresponds to around 9.9 million euros when adjusted for inflation).
On October 3, 2006, the bridge was named "Bridge of German Unity" on the initiative of the Federal Foundation for Coming to terms with the SED dictatorship .
More bridges across the Saale
literature
- Federal Ministry of Transport: Bridges and tunnels on federal highways 1996 . Verkehrsblattverlag, Dortmund 1996, ISBN 3-89273-073-3 , ( Verkehrsblatt-Dokument B 5134), pp. 25-34.
- Axel Doßmann: On the inner-German border. The Saale Bridge on the Berlin-Munich motorway 1936–2006. State Center for Civic Education Thuringia, Erfurt 2012, ISBN 978-3-937967-83-7 .
- J. Weber, U. Scholz, E. Seeber, M. Curbach, F. Tiarks: Saalebrücke Rudolphstein . In: Bauingenieur 71, 1996, ISSN 0005-6650 , pp. 173-184.
- Roland May : Pontifex maximus. The architect Paul Bonatz and the bridges. Monsenstein and Vannerdat , Münster iW 2011, ISBN 978-3-86991-176-2 , pp. 289-297, 533f., 614f.
Web links
- Erwin Purucker: From Rudolphstein to Hirschberg - pictures of the inner German border
- Ulli Kulke: Germany's scariest motorway bridge. Welt , November 25, 2013, accessed February 12, 2019 .
Individual evidence
- ^ Third Reich Ruins
- ^ Ulli Kulke: The scariest motorway bridge in Germany. welt.de, November 25, 2013, accessed November 25, 2013
- ↑ Forum K shows a view over the Rudolphstein-Hirschberg motorway bridge. Online magazine Spitzenstadt.de, accessed on February 12, 2019 .