The Ravenna Bridge is a high and long railway

viaduct A viaduct is a specific type of bridge that consists of a series of arches, piers or columns supporting a long elevated railway or road. Typically a viaduct connects two points of roughly equal elevation, allowing direct overpass across a wide ...

on the Höllental Railway line in the

Black Forest The Black Forest ( ) is a large forested mountain range in the States of Germany, state of Baden-Württemberg in southwest Germany, bounded by the Rhine Valley to the west and south and close to the borders with France and Switzerland. It is th ...

, in

Breitnau Breitnau is a Municipalities of Germany, municipality in the district of Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald in Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany, about 30 kilometres from the city of Freiburg im Breisgau. It is located within the High Black Forest. Ge ...

Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald () is a (district) in the southwest of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Fifty towns and municipalities with 133 settlements lie within the district. The district itself belongs to the region of Freiburg with the region of Sou ...

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg ( ; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a states of Germany, German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million i ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. The bridge crosses the Ravenna Gorge that ends in the upper Höllental valley, and has a

grade Grade most commonly refers to: * Grading in education, a measurement of a student's performance by educational assessment (e.g. A, pass, etc.) * A designation for students, classes and curricula indicating the number of the year a student has reach ...

of . The origin of the name most likely comes from the French ''ravin'' for gorge.

History and construction

The first structure was completed in 1885 and consisted of a steel cantilever span that rested on three mortared

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

block pillars. The bridge had a slight curve, and trains were limited to a speed of and an

axle load The axle load of a wheeled vehicle is the total weight bearing on the roadway for all wheels connected to a given axle. Axle load is an important design consideration in the engineering of roadways and railways, as both are designed to tolerate a m ...

of . Heavier locomotives and faster speeds led to the construction in 1926–27 of the current structure, a mortared stone viaduct with nine arches and an arch span of , which also had the effect of straightening the railway line. The old bridge was then demolished, although the old

abutment An abutment is the substructure at the ends of a bridge span or dam supporting its superstructure. Single-span bridges have abutments at each end that provide vertical and lateral support for the span, as well as acting as retaining walls ...

s are still visible. The Ravenna Tunnel that follows immediately after the bridge was originally long. It was partially cut open and thus has a length today of only . The bridge was exploded by German forces near the end of the

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. It was re-built in 1947–48, under the direction of French occupying forces and with the use of German prisoners of war obligated to undertake compulsory labour, so that large quantities of logs from the Black Forest that had to be delivered as war reparations could be transported out.

References

{{Authority control Railway bridges in Germany Stone bridges in Germany Viaducts in Germany Stone arch bridges