The Sutong Bridge is a cable stayed bridge which spans the Yangtze River in China that is currently under construction. It will be built between Nantong and Changshu. It is currently due to open in 2009. With a span of 1,088 metres, it will become the longest cable stayed bridge in the world. Overall the bridge length will be 8,206 metres. Construction has been estimated to cost about $750 million.
STONECUTTERS BRIDGE, HONG KONG, CHINA
Work will commence on Angchuanzhou Bridge, otherwise known as Stonecutters Bridge, in 2004. By the time it is completed in 2008 the bridge will be the longest of its type in the world, with a span of 1,018m and an overall length of 1,596m. Straddling the Rambler Channel at the entrance to the busy Kwai Chung Container Port, it will form part of Route 9 which links Tsing Yi and Cheung Sha Wan.
The bridge will span the Rambler Channel from the back-up land of Container Terminal 8 (CT8) at the eastern side on Stonecutters Island to the back-up land being formed for Container Terminal 9 (CT9) on Tsing Yi Island.
STONECUTTERS BRIDGE DESIGN
The design concept for the bridge was procured by Highways Department in Hong Kong through an international design competition and the winning scheme by a group consisting of Halcrow Group, Flint & Neill Partnership, Dissing + Weitling and Shanghai Municipal Engineering Design Institute was selected as the Reference Scheme for the further design development. A group led by Ove Arup & Partners with COWI A/S as main sub-consultant has carried out the further design development of the Reference Scheme and the detailed design that followed.
The concept is for a cable-stayed bridge with a twin aerodynamic deck suspended from two 295m-high single pole towers. These towers will have bases measuring 24m x 18m tapering to 7m diameter at the top, and the deck will allow a navigation clearance of 73.5m over the full entrance to the Container Port.
The two towers will be in concrete until level +175m and in composite construction consisting of an inner concrete ring with a stainless steel skin for the top 120m. The original concept had a conventional steel structure above level +175m but Arup found that this configuration would be too lively and lead to unacceptable vibrations of the stay cables. Using a heavier composite section instead of a pure steel structure solved this problem. For reasons of durability and to enhance the appearance, further studies concluded that the tower skin should be fabricated from a duplex stainless steel (grade 1.4462 to BSEN10088) with a shot peened surface finish. The deck itself will be made of steel in the main span and of concrete in the side spans.
The tower foundations will be located within 10m of the seawall on either side of the Rambler Channel, close to the back-up land next to CT8 and CT9. Their proximity to the channel necessitated ship impact testing and modeling. Geotechnical centrifuge testing was conducted using a 1:200 scale model of a vessel bow section and seawall within a container.
