252548 Resource 79668 1071 1071 1268923060516 1268947659190 Controlled IDOT Composite Bridge Installed in Under Five Hours Over Little Canteen Creek, Fairview Heights, IL

It took Keeley and Sons just under five hours from the time they started unloading the first section of Infrastructure Composites' newest composite bridge, to the time the fourth and final section was bonded in place.

<p><img height="200" alt="Trucking the first section of IDOT's new Composite Bridge, built by Infrastructure Composiites International" hspace="10" src="http://www.yesterdaysphotos.com/Architecture/2010-02-16-InfraComp/DSC4558/812410241_kknvn-S.jpg" width="300" align="left" style="width: 300px; height: 200px" />By John Gaudio,</p> <p>Last Tuesday, March 16th, 2010, in just under five hours Keeley and Sons installed&nbsp;this thirty seven foot composite bridge over&nbsp;Little Canteen Creek in Fairview Heights IL.&nbsp; The bridge was&nbsp;built in Denver, Colorado by Infrastructure Composites International, and trucked to Illinois&nbsp;late last year.&nbsp; It consists of four sections, two of which include integrated guard rails.&nbsp; See link below for more photos.</p> <p>The bridge was built using&nbsp;Infrastructure Composites' proprietary large cell honeycomb technology, developed by John Kunz, one of the owners of Infrastructure Composites, and his father <img height="199" alt="Last of four sections of this Fairview Heights Composite Bridege is moved into position." hspace="10" src="http://www.yesterdaysphotos.com/Architecture/2010-02-16-InfraComp/DSC5095/812430063_Q4siH-S.jpg" width="300" align="left" />Ben&nbsp;Kunz.&nbsp; This&nbsp;makes&nbsp;it possible to create bridges&nbsp;with remarkable strength at weights typically&nbsp;75-85% less than traditional steel or concrete bridges, making the installation of a complete bridge much faster, easier, and less expensive, when compared to the installation of typical&nbsp;bridges.&nbsp; Pre fabricated bridges like these have a projected lifetime of 50-75 years, and can be installed at the site in one day.&nbsp; This avoids lengthy road shutdowns, traffic disruption, and the high costs associated with both.</p> <p>This technology can also be used to put new decks on older bridges, making it possible to re-rate those older bridges for a much greater traffic load than that for which they were <img height="186" alt="Less than five hours after the first section came off the truck, it's a bridge!" hspace="10" src="http://www.yesterdaysphotos.com/Architecture/2010-02-16-InfraComp/DSC5316-5308/812438868_SoZNN-S.jpg" width="300" align="left" />originally designed, and&nbsp;solving a common problem with bridges built decades ago for lower load ratings.&nbsp; Why can these bridges be re-rated?&nbsp; Because the existing structure now has to support only 15-25% of the static deck load for which it was originally designed, leaving a great deal more capacity for increased traffic loads,&nbsp;and&nbsp;eliminating the need for a new bridge. This makes for&nbsp;huge savings, not only in money, but in&nbsp;time, and labor as well,&nbsp;when compared with the cost of replacing existing bridges with conventional steel and concrete technologies.</p> <p>Infrastructure Composites can be reached at 858-537-0715.<br />&nbsp;<br />(Disclosure: I have known John Kunz for over 20 years, own a small amount of stock in Infrastructure Composites International, and provide photo, video, and&nbsp;Internet marketing&nbsp;services for the company.&nbsp; Please contact me at 303-870-1044 if you need similar services.)</p> 9 application/xml false Composite Bridge Fairview Heights Infrastructure Composites International John Gaudio Keeley and Sons Little Canteen Creek Veiw more phots of the installation, and check out other photo galleries I've created for clients. http://www.yesterdaysphotos.com/Architecture/2010-02-16-InfraComp/11537348_VTCcQ#812410241_kknvn Infrastructure Composites International provides a large cell honeycomb fiber reinforced polymer composite structural panel system. Our system is used to build bridges, such as the fiberglass bridge built for KSCI over No Name Creek in Russell Kansas. It is also used to create buildings, large free span domes, arch structures and other large enclosures of many types. This system creates superior, cost effective structures, with excellent strength to weight ratios. It is an ideal solution for the creation of structures for many applications. http://Infracomp.com IDOT web site http://www.dot.state.il.us Fairview, Heights, City, Illinois,Parks, St. Clair County, Fairivew Heights Parks and Recreation, Fairview Police, St. Clair Square, Scott Air base http://www.ci.fairview-heights.il.us Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 5.1; GTB6.4; .NET CLR 1.0.3705; .NET CLR 1.1.4322; Media Center PC 4.0; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; OfficeLiveConnector.1.3; OfficeLivePatch.0.0) 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 johngaudio 174.51.202.6 false true false false true 176085 false false true false false false true 79668 blog blogsite/ABetterBlogsite/web