THE WIDER VIEW: Taking Shape, The New Bridge At The Hoover Dam

Daily Mail (UK) ^ | July 04th 2009

[Steelfish]

THE WIDER VIEW: Taking shape, the new bridge at the Hoover Dam

04th July 2009

Creeping closer inch by inch – 900ft above the mighty Colorado River – the two sides of a £160million bridge at the Hoover Dam in America slowly take shape.

The bridge will carry a new section of US Route 93 past the bottleneck of the old road which can be seen twisting and winding around and across the dam itself.

When complete, it will provide a new link between the states of Nevada and Arizona. In an incredible feat of engineering, the road will be supported on the two massive concrete arches which jut out of the rock face.

The arches are made up of 53 individual sections – each 24ft long – which have been cast on-site and are being lifted into place using an improvised high-wire crane strung between temporary steel pylons.

Spectacular: The new Hoover Dam bypass

The arches will eventually measure more than 1,000ft across. At the moment, the structure looks like a traditional suspension bridge. But once the arches are complete, the suspending cables on each side will be removed.

Extra vertical columns will then be installed on the arches to carry the road. The bridge has become known as the Hoover Dam bypass, although it is officially called the Mike O'Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge, after a former governor of Nevada and an American Football player from Arizona who joined the US Army and was killed in Afghanistan.

Work on the bridge started in 2005 and should finish next year. An estimated 17,000 cars and trucks will cross it every day. The dam was started in 1931 and used enough concrete to build a road from New York to San Francisco.

The stretch of water it created, Lake Mead...

[Steve Van Doorn]

are they going to have a walk way on that bridge?

[Ready4Freddy]

Updated pics I rcv'd in email today, not sure how current they are. One section left on the roadway arches:

Looking South

Looking Northeast

Nice Aerial Shot

Closeup of cablework on towers

Closeup of arch construction

Closeup of arch with dam in background

[Ready4Freddy]

Updated pics of the construction of the Hoover Dam bypass bridge that y’all commented on way back in July.

>2 MB of pics.

[Flycatcher]

Thanks for the updated pics. As it so happens, I just crossed the dam yesterday (for the one-millionth time) and there are now columns rising from the arch span.

Last I heard, the project should be done before Christmas of 2010.

Now that's a Christmas present I can appreciate (though ties are nice too).

[Ready4Freddy]

Hey Flycatcher, glad I was able to pass them along. Any idea what time frame these pics were? If the columns on the spans are well under way, these pics were probably taken Aug / early Sept (at the latest)?

Did you notice the kayaks in the pic of the cable towers?

[Flycatcher]

There are about six colums now rising from the middle of the arch span (which you can see in the second pic of your recent photo post). They're not very high yet -- maybe each one is ten or twenty feet high -- so I would date your photos at (maybe) one month old.

Yes, things move fast at the construction site!

As for the kayakers, I did notice them. Just a little downstream, there is a launch area where local kayak sightseeing companies launch their tours. I would venture to say that these kayakers paddled upstream a short ways to watch the marvel that will soon be the magnificent bypass bridge.

No, we may not be able to build magnificent dams anymore, but America sure can build magnificent bypasses!

[fieldmarshaldj]

Great pics, thanks for posting ‘em. Can’t wait to see the bridge completed.

[machogirl]

Thanks for the pics. Since I have a fear of heights, I can’t imagine what it must have been one of the rope guys working on the dam, and these guys working on the bridge. Really nice, clear pictures.