On 11 June last, open house was held at the sites of the work to build the bridge over the Danube between the cities of Vidin, Bulgaria, and Calafat, Romania. More than 80 people, accompanied by authorities and the media, visited the location of the bridge work, which is being done by FCC.

The guests observed how the bridge is being built from a temporary peninsula, and they toured the site of the work being done in the navigable channel of the river, the free-trade zone facilities (where all the segments needed to build the bridge and its flyovers are being manufactured) and some of the sites where related infrastructure work is being done (Novo Selo and Bregovo junctions, the goods station and the Kula flyover).

The biggest Bulgarian construction project, the second bridge over the Danube is a total of 1,951 metres long. The project consists in the construction of a combined bridge for vehicular and railway traffic. It contains four vehicle lanes, a single set of rails, a bicycle lane, two pavements for pedestrians and service uses and the necessary infrastructure for vehicular and rail traffic; this includes a new goods station, seven new kilometres of rail, the refurbishment of the existing passenger station and the building of seven junctions.

Altogether, the project involves the construction of the railway access viaduct to the bridge (over land) and the precast segment bridge itself. The bridge has 13 spans whose lengths range between 80 metres in the non-navigable channel and 180 metres in the navigable channel. All foundations have now been finished, and work is being done to assemble the deck over the non-navigable channel and the pylons in the navigable channel.

During construction it is proving necessary to find solutions to various sorts of major difficulties: technical difficulties, as a consequence of the very magnitude of the structure; and weather- and river-related difficulties, as a result of the changeability of weather conditions in this area of Europe and the volume of the Danube. Ninety-five percent of the work is being done using FCC Construcción’s own equipment.

Quite a job is being done at the precasting plant set up especially for this project. The plant produces the cast concrete segments that are subsequently assembled into the bridge. A harbour has had to be built, including high-tonnage permanent lifting equipment, in order to afford access to the river from the plant.

The infrastructure forms part of Corridor IV, which joins Dresden, Germany, and Istanbul, Turkey. More than 600 people, 75% of whom are Bulgarian, are working on the construction project. The budget for the bridge over the Danube and its accesses from the Bulgarian side is more than 162 million euro, and the job is being done with European grants under the ISPA (Instrument for Structural Policies for Pre-Accession) programme and with financing from the European Investment Bank, France and Germany.