Can Gili footbridge over the BV-1432 highway in Granollers

Abstract

The construction of the Can Gili footbridge was an old claim of the inhabitants of the two neighbourhoods separated from one another by the trench of the BV-1432 road in Granollers. The design we proposed was strongly conditioned by the asymmetric shape of the obstacle that had to be crossed and by the bad ground conditions on the top of the south slope. It is formed by a main deck, composed by a cranked shape continuous Corten steel beam, with two supports, one at each side of the road, and a secondary deck. The latter is a simply supported structure that spans 13.9 metres, from the top angle of the former to the free end of its cantilevered span. The primary deck has a main span of 32.7 metres and a cantilevered side span of 5.0 metres. The construction started in June 2009 with the upgrading of the south approach and the construction of the foundations. Meanwhile, the steel structure was fabricated twenty kilometres away from the site. When the abutments were ready, the deck was transported to the site in four sections and erected with the help of a temporary tower. Once the deck was put into place, the mandatory static load test was carried out. The works finished by the construction of the north approach and the installation of the public lighting and the street furniture. The footbridge was open to the public in January 2010.