Taizhou Yangtze River Bridge——The first kilometer level three-pylon two-span suspension bridge in the world

Taizhou Bridge, located at the middle of Jiangsu Province, connecting Taizhou City and Zhenjiang City, started in Dec. 2007. The bridge is the first kilometer level three-pylon suspension bridge in the world, and it adopts longitudinal herringbone shape steel middle pylon for the first time in the world. The foundation of the middle tower is the deepest underwater caisson in soil on earth. A great many of technical innovations such as the design techniques of three-pylon suspension bridge,precisely locating and bottom-sealing techniques of the large scale caisson foundation, manufacturing, combination techniques of steel and concrete in the middle tower, welding of extra thick steel plate, manufacture and control techniques of abnormal sections of the middle tower and so on were introduced.

Scaled down model design of shaking table test of Taizhou Bridge

Taizhou Bridge is the first kilometer level three-pylon two-span suspension bridge in the world and the structural complexity has significant effects on the seismic performance of the bridge. Shaking table test of Taizhou Bridge is arranged to investigate the effects of non-uniform ground motion input, collision between main and side spans and optimal seismic structural system. It's very important and difficult to design and manufacture the scaled down model of Taizhou Bridge used during the shaking table test. The key point is that the girder and pylons are very hard to be manufactured if the similarity ratio is strictly followed. Based on the finite element method (FEM) analysis, a simplified scaled down model is designed and the bending stiffness of the girder and pylon are strictly simulated, and the torsion stiffness and axial stiffness are not strictly simulated. The inner forces and displacements of critical sections, points of simplified model and theoretical model are compared by FEM analysis, and it's found out that the difference between the seismic responses is relatively small. So, the simplified model can be used to conduct the shaking table test by the FEM verification.

Research on key technologies in design of middle pylon of Taizhou Bridge

At the middle pylon of a three-pylon two-span suspension bridge, the effect of unbalanced loads on the adjacent spans may result in a series of technical bottlenecks in design, such as stability and anti-slippage between saddles and main cables. This article presents the researches conducted on structure selection and behavior characteristics of middle pylon, interaction mechanism between main cables and saddles and their anti-slippage safety performance, elastic and plastic stability analysis and safety assessment of steel middle pylon, and fatigue design load and method for steel pylon of Taizhou Bridge. According to the research results, a longitudinal inverted Y shape steel middle pylon is used in design, effectively solving many technical difficulties, and this type of pylon has become a suitable middle pylon structural form for many three-ovlon two-soan susoension bridges.

Design of steel box girder for Taizhou Yangtze River Highway Bridge

Taizhou Yangtze River Highway Bridge is the first three-pylon two-span suspension bridge in China. The main girder adopts flat steamline steel closed box girder which has well wind-resistant capability and is technically mature besides beautiful appearance. Straight web plates of the steel box girder in longitudinal direction are proposed in order to ensure the integrity of the steel box girder, and to keep the stress of the steel box girder continuous in the middle pylon, as well as to reduce the gradient of the middle pylon columns. The cross section of the box girder has one box with three cells. Solid-web diaphragm plate with good integrity and high torsional stiffness is adopted. The lifting lugs are utilized in the anchors of suspender cable. In this paper, selection of the cross section of the steel box girder, the general structure design, local structure design and main structure calculation results of Taizhou Yangtze River Bridge are introduced emphatically.