Maurzyce Bridge
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The Maurzyce Bridge (
Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...
: ''Most w Maurzycach'') is a bridge over the Słudwia River (tributary of
Bzura The Bzura is a river in central Poland, a tributary of the Vistula river (in Wyszogród), with a length of 173 kilometres and a basin area of 7,764 km2.welded Welding is a fabrication process that joins materials, usually metals or thermoplastics, by using high heat to melt the parts together and allowing them to cool, causing fusion. Welding is distinct from lower temperature techniques such as braz ...
road bridge and the second welded bridge of any category in the world. The bridge is located close to the village of
Maurzyce Maurzyce is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Zduny, within Łowicz County, Łódź Voivodeship, in central Poland. It lies approximately south-east of Zduny, north-west of Łowicz, and north-east of the regional capital Łód ...
near
Łowicz Łowicz is a town in central Poland with 27,896 inhabitants (2020). It is situated in the Łódź Voivodeship (since 1999); previously, it was in Skierniewice Voivodeship (1975–1998). Together with a nearby station of Bednary, Łowicz is a ma ...
in
Łódź Voivodeship Łódź Voivodeship (also known as Lodz Province, or by its Polish name ''Województwo łódzkie'' ) is a province-voivodeship in central Poland. It was created on 1 January 1999 out of the former Łódź Voivodeship (1975–1999) and the Sieradz ...
.


History


Design

The bridge was designed in 1927 by
Stefan Bryła Stefan Władysław Bryła (Polish pronunciation: ; born 17 August 1886 in Kraków – died 3 December 1943 in Warsaw, Poland) was a Polish construction engineer and welding pioneer. He designed and built the first welded road bridge in the world ...
, one of the pioneers of welding in
civil engineering Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads, bridges, canals, dams, airports, sewage ...
. Bryła, a professor at the
Lwów University of Technology Lviv Polytechnic National University ( ua, Націона́льний університе́т «Льві́вська політе́хніка») is the largest scientific university in Lviv, Ukraine. Since its foundation in 1816, it has bee ...
, conducted extensive theoretical studies on possible usage of welded steel joints in construction, as well as various aspects of
oxy-fuel welding Principle of burn cutting Oxy-fuel welding (commonly called oxyacetylene welding, oxy welding, or gas welding in the United States) and oxy-fuel cutting are processes that use fuel gases (or liquid fuels such as gasoline or petrol, diesel, ...
and electric arc welding. Both procedures have been known at least since late 19th century, but their application was mostly limited to house and
shipbuilding Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and other floating vessels. It normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces its roots to befor ...
. However, since the tests proved welded joints could be strong enough to sustain large forces, in mid-1920s Bryła decided to design a welded bridge. He used his earlier design of a riveted bridge, which Bryła and Wenczesław Poniż converted to use the new construction method. However, the cross-beams and some elements of the chords were re-designed from scratch. Although designed first, the bridge was the second such bridge ''constructed''; a similar yet shorter welded railway bridge was designed and build a few months earlier in
Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania Turtle Creek is a borough in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, southeast of Pittsburgh. The population was 5,349 at the 2010 census. George Westinghouse constructed a manufacturing plant nearby. Turtle Creek takes its name from a small stream th ...
by
Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing The Westinghouse Electric Corporation was an American manufacturing company founded in 1886 by George Westinghouse. It was originally named "Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company" and was renamed "Westinghouse Electric Corporation" in ...
and holds the record for the first welded bridge of any type in the world. The then-new technique of
arc welding Arc welding is a welding process that is used to join metal to metal by using electricity to create enough heat to melt metal, and the melted metals, when cool, result in a binding of the metals. It is a type of welding that uses a welding powe ...
allowed considerable weight savings: its overall weight is 56 metric tons, while a
rivet A rivet is a permanent mechanical fastener. Before being installed, a rivet consists of a smooth cylindrical shaft with a head on one end. The end opposite to the head is called the ''tail''. On installation, the rivet is placed in a punched ...
ed version would have weighed over 70 tons. Apart from construction method, the construction itself is an ordinary
truss bridge A truss bridge is a bridge whose load-bearing superstructure is composed of a truss, a structure of connected elements, usually forming triangular units. The connected elements (typically straight) may be stressed from tension, compression, or ...
with two main truss beams, a straight bottom chord and a parabolic top chord. In addition to two lanes for road traffic, the bridge also includes two side-walks for pedestrians.


Construction

As the task of building such a structure was considered extremely risky, the
K. Rudzki i S-ka K. Rudzki i S-ka (Konstanty Rudzki & Co. Ltd.) was a Polish engineering and machinery company. Founded in Warsaw in 1858 as an iron foundry by a shipbuilding magnate Andrzej Artur Zamoyski and led by Konstanty Rudzki, it soon expanded into machin ...
Company was chosen as the main contractor, fabricator and builder. The company with its seat in Warsaw and a large factory in
Mińsk Mazowiecki Mińsk Mazowiecki () "''Masovian Minsk''") is a town in eastern Poland with 40,999 inhabitants (2020). It is situated in the Masovian Voivodeship (since 1999) and is a part of the Warsaw Agglomeration. It is the capital of Mińsk County. Locate ...
was among the most experienced bridge building companies in Central and Eastern Europe at the time. Established in 1853, in late 19th and early 20th century the company was the only firm in the entire
Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...
to construct difficult bridges in remote locations. Almost 20% of all bridges constructed in Russia in that period were built by Konstanty Rudzki and his engineers. Altogether in the first two decades of 20th century the company built 5,000 metres of steel road bridges and 24,000 metres of various rail bridges for 37 different railway companies, in addition to providing them with a net of over 2 million metres of water pipelines. Among the steel bridges constructed by K. Rudzki were Warsaw's
Poniatowski Bridge The Poniatowski Bridge ( pl, Most Poniatowskiego) is a bridge in Warsaw, Poland. Originally built between 1904 and 1914, it was damaged in each World War and rebuilt after each. It spans the Vistula River, connecting Warsaw's Powiśle and Praga ...
, but also most of
Trans-Siberian Railway The Trans-Siberian Railway (TSR; , , ) connects European Russia to the Russian Far East. Spanning a length of over , it is the longest railway line in the world. It runs from the city of Moscow in the west to the city of Vladivostok in the ea ...
's river crossings, including the 1916
Khabarovsk Bridge Khabarovsk Bridge is a road and rail bridge built in 1999. It crosses the Amur River in eastern Russia, and connects the urban-type settlement of Imeni Telmana in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast with the city of Khabarovsk in Khabarovsk Krai. Unt ...
(at over 2,500 metres of length for decades the longest bridge in Euro-Asia). The company also built bridges for the
Saint Petersburg–Warsaw Railway Saint Petersburg–Warsaw Railway (() (transliteration: Sankt-Peterburgo–Varshavskaya zheleznaya doroga)) is a long railway, built in the 19th century by the Russian Empire to connect Russia with Central Europe. At the time the entire railwa ...
,
Amur Railway The broad gauge Amur Railway (russian: Амурская железная дорога, or Amurskaya zheleznaya doroga) is the last section of the Trans-Siberian Railway in Russia, built in 1907–1916. The construction of this railway favoured t ...
,
Ussuri Railway The Ussuri or Wusuli (russian: Уссури; ) is a river that runs through Khabarovsk and Primorsky Krais, Russia and the southeast region of Northeast China. It rises in the Sikhote-Alin mountain range, flowing north and forming part of the Si ...
and
Chinese Eastern Railway The Chinese Eastern Railway or CER (, russian: Китайско-Восточная железная дорога, or , ''Kitaysko-Vostochnaya Zheleznaya Doroga'' or ''KVZhD''), is the historical name for a railway system in Northeast China (als ...
, among others. Yet, even with such experience, the construction of the bridge across Słudwia near Łowicz proved to be a difficult task. The elements were manufactured by the K. Rudzki i S-ka factory in Mińsk Mazowiecki and then welded into place on the spot. It was completed in December 1928 and opened to normal road traffic in August of the following year. Despite welding being much more expensive than time-consuming riveting, the overall bridge cost was much lower, in large part due to 17% less steel needed to build it and shorter construction time.


Later history

Revolutionary at the time, the completion of the Maurzyce Bridge sparked a new era in bridge construction worldwide. The construction was described in European and American engineering press, and engineers from around the world visited the new bridge in large numbers. Consequently, Poland was the first country in the world to regulate the construction of welded bridges. Until the late 1970s the bridge was used by National road 2, the Polish section of the
European route E8 The European route E8 is a European route that goes from Tromsø, Norway to Turku, Finland. The length of the route is . * E8: Tromsø – Nordkjosbotn – Skibotn – Kilpisjärvi – Kaaresuvanto – Muonio – Tornio – Keminmaa – Kemi ...
. However, as it proved too narrow, in 1977 it was moved some 20 metres to the north, closed to traffic, and a new replacement was built in its place. The bridge was inscribed on the list of
objects of cultural heritage in Poland Cultural property protection ( pl, ochrona zabytków) in Poland Cultural property im Poland According to Polish law, a cultural property item ( pl, zabytek; its plural form, pl, zabytki, means cultural property) is defined as an "immovable or a m ...
on 22 November 1968 by the Monument Documentation Authority (predecessor to the National Heritage Board), and initially (until that category was abolished in 1973) it was listed among the "Grade Zero monuments" ( pl, zabytek klasy 0), that is the most prized historical monuments of international significance. Later it was re-classified as an "unmovable historical monument". The bridge was refurbished in 2009. At the cost of 800,000 the steel construction was cleaned of rust and repainted silver, and the road surface was replaced with a granite
sett A sett or set is a badger, badger's den. It usually consists of a network of tunnels and numerous entrances. The largest setts are spacious enough to accommodate 15 or more animals with up to of tunnels and as many as 40 openings. Such elaborat ...
. In 2011 a memorial plaque to professor Bryła was unveiled in front of it.


References


Citations


Bibliography

* * * * * * * {{commons category, Bridge in Maurzyce Road bridges in Poland Łowicz County Objects of cultural heritage in Poland Truss bridges Pedestrian bridges in Poland