Construction of а cable-stayed bridge to the Russky Island
across the Eastern Bosphorus Strait in Vladivostok

Thirty of 33 piers of the unique bridge across the Eastern Boshporus Strait, including the two largest bridge piers – М1 (Nazimov Peninsula) and М12 (Russky Island) – have been brought to design elevation.

According to Alexey Baranov, Director of USK MOST’s Vladivostok branch, the two bridge piers (M1 and M12) will function as a cross-over span and take horizontal loads from the elevated road superstructure and the cable-stayed bridge’s stiffening beam.

Bridge pier M12 on Russky Island

Each pier contains approx. 8000 m3 of high-grade concrete. Each of the flat-topped bridge piers is 35 m high. Each pier column is 8.9х18.5 m. They house channels for engineering networks and rooms for equipment to monitor the condition of the bridge crossing structures after the bridge is commissioned.

Progress on the other project jobsites is going as scheduled. Pour No. 5 of the overhead road slab (trestle span EN15-EN16) on the Nazimov Peninsula has been concreted. This required 157 m3 of concrete. Pour length is 24.7 m, width is 25.4 m, and thickness is 25 cm.

Construction of 320 m bridge towers is underway on either side of the Eastern Bosphorus. It should be noted that construction of pours Nos. 12-14 is one of the most challenging phases of construction of the giant bridge towers; at this phase, their pier columns will be coupled by a lower link beam, which will function as a rest for the bridge stiffening beam.

Bridge tower M7 on Russky Island

Fixing the 600 t structure in this part of the bridge tower requires doubled reinforcement and installation of embedded parts with sophisticated anchorage via conventional flexible rests and Dywidag stressed reinforcing bars and high-strength cables. The extremely complicated reinforcement and the need to construct three diaphragm plates in each pier column within 12-14 pours substantially increases working time. However, sophisticated technical support for all processes and competent engineering staff ensure top-quality solutions to the most complicated tasks.

At present, the bridge builders have completed concreting Pour No. 14 of the pier column of the giant М6 tower on the Nazimov Peninsula. The operation was conducted non-stop over 17 hours. Pour reinforcement consumed 24 t of main reinforcement, and 183 m3 of concrete were poured. The right-hand pier column of tower M6 is 67.9 m asl. Current operations include preparation for concreting Pour No. 12 of the left-hand pier column of bridge tower М7 on Russky Island.

Daniil Goncharuk / SK MOST

Photo by Igor Lischuk / SK MOST

During a business visit to Vladivostok, a team of Japanese professionals headed by Shigeto Tanaka, President of Tokyo Rope MFG, inspected the construction site of the bridge across the Eastern Bosphorus Strait.

The visit was arranged under the Agreement of Intent between Tokyo Rope MFG and ОАО USK MOST on collaboration in bridge building and comprehensive engineering protection of infrastructure. It should be noted that the Japanese company is a global leader in the fabrication of completion materials for bridge building projects. It is an expert in fabrication of steel wire ropes, cables, metal cords and cable stays. The company also designs and constructs road safety structures (road fences, rockfall and mud flow protection structures), environmental protection (sound barriers) elements, industrial equipment, metal fiber. Materials manufactured by Tokyo Rope MFG were used for construction of the world’s 20 largest and best known suspension bridges.

In order to define collaboration areas, the Russian and Japanese parties will establish an engineering committee. During the visit to Vladivostok, representatives of two leading corporations of the Land of the Rising Sun – Tokyo Rope MFG and Мitsui & Co.Ltd – inspected the construction site of the bridge across the Eastern Bosphorus Strait and visited jobsites on Nazimov Peninsula and Russky Island.

Nazimov Peninsula

Russky Island

Shigeto Tanaka (Tokyo Rope MFG): “Thanks to a warm welcome by the senior management of Vladivostok’s branch of USK MOST, this visit appeared was very informative”. “My teammates were especially impressed by the project’s social infrastructure – living and nutritional conditions for workers at the jobsite. This is a very high level! And we were absolutely impressed by construction of the world’s largest bridge, which was mobilized in a very short time on the mainland and Russky Island. During the visit we witnessed high rates of preparation for the APEC 2012 Summit and urban development. My colleagues and I are absolutely sure that such a grand bridge across the Eastern Bosphorus Strait will be a source of pride not only for Vladivostok, but for Russia as well”.

“Construction of a bridge across the Eastern Bosphorus Strait is based on the latest theoretical and practical knowledge of domestic and global bridge building”, said Alexey Baranov, Director of USK MOST’s Vladivostok branch. “Due to a know-how package, the bridge to Russky Island will become a sophisticated element of the transport infrastructure. Our Japanese counterparts are leading manufacturers of completion materials for bridge building projects, and such collaboration is both useful and productive.”

Daniil Goncharuk /SK MOST

Photo: Igor Lischuk /SK MOST

The bridge crossing over the Eastern Bosphorus Strait became the first and only bridge in the country to be equipped with up-to-date automatic meteorological stations.

On-line information about changes in the extreme coastal weather will be supplied to USK MOST’s control room from two meteorological stations installed on the Nazimov Peninsula and Russky Island.

The first meteorological station was installed on the mainland side. It is already being used to monitor safety during facility construction.

Nazimov Peninsula

Preparatory work for starting up the second meteorological complex on Russky Island has now been completed– the site has been concreted and an antenna mast has been installed near support M10.
Detachable equipment installation will start in the next few days. After startup, the second meteorological station will transmit data on wind force and direction, air temperature and humidity, atmospheric pressure and amount of precipitation every 5 minutes.

Russky Island

The Primorsky Territory Department for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring will maintain the meteorological complex and collect and process the meteorological data. Online information from computers installed at the Meteorological Office will be transferred to the dispatchers at USK MOST, which is the general construction contractor for the Russky Island bridge.

“The bridge crossing over the Eastern Bosphorus Strait has no counterparts in the world, and now dispatchers will be able to receive reliable online data on actual atmospheric air conditions and other weather reports”, said Sergei Mikhalev, the Gidromet Project Manager of LANIT. “These are currently the only meteorological stations in Russia installed on a bridge, and I’m glad we could also make our contribution to the preparations for the APEC-2012 Summit. In fact, decisions on the safety of work at the unique facility and its further operation will be based on the information received from the meteorological stations”.

A total of four meteorological stations will be installed on the bridge crossing over the Eastern Bosphorus Strait. In addition to two ground stations, there are plans to install two stations on the tops of 320-meter-high pylons, since weather parameters up high must also be considered for correct bridge operation.

The unique facility is being constructed in extremely severe climatic conditions – fogs, storms, heavy snowfalls and snowstorms occur frequently here, while wind blasts reach 20 m/s near the ground and 30-35 m/s at the level of the high supports. This year, Vladivostok experienced a very cold and snowy winter – the temperature reached minus 30°C, and the Eastern Bosphorus Strait was covered with ice floes. Nearly 200 storm alerts have been received since the start of construction.

“Obviously, it’s very important to ensure hydrometeorological safety during construction of the bridge crossing to Russky Island”, said Alexei Baranov, Director of USK MOST’s branch in Vladivostok. “The expert engineering preparation, which was carried out with consideration of the climatic conditions of Primorsky Territory and directly in the construction area, helps maintain a high construction work rate”.

All factors imposed by navigation conditions and severe geological, climatic and seismic conditions of the area have been considered while working on the unique project. The bridge will be equipped with a comprehensive monitoring system consisting of hundreds of sensors to make the bridge structure immune to natural and technogenic disasters. They will make it possible to monitor changes in exposure parameters and force and geometric parameters of the bridge crossing structure on a real-time basis.

Bridge conditions will be also monitored with the help of the Global Navigation Satellite System – GLONASS. The satellite system will be precisely monitoring the geometric parameters of the huge structure connecting the mainland and Russky Island using the receiving equipment installed on the bridge.

Daniil Goncharuk / SK MOST

Photo by: Igor Lischuk / SK MOST

Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev inspected the construction of APEC Summit facilities, using a motor boat as his vantage poin. Now the private collection of the head of state, who is known for his interest in photography, has been supplemented with pictures of the unique bridge leading to Russkiy Island over the Eastern Bosphorus.

The Far East should become a region with a comfortable standard of living for its people. New jobs should be created and business should be given an opportunity to develop. This was the task set by the president during his visit to the Jewish Autonomous Region, Amur Region and Khabarovsk and Maritime Territories. The final stop on his tour of the Far East was Vladivostok, which is celebrating its 150th anniversary.

After congratulating the city during the “Vladivostok – heart of the ocean” gala concert on Saturday, on Sunday the president inspected the construction of several facilities being built for the 2012 APEC Summit. Incidentally, despite his busy schedule, the President found time in almost every town to take photos. Now his private collection has been supplemented with scenes from the Far East, the border with China and fragments from military exercises in the Pacific Ocean. While inspecting from the motor boat, he could not resist standing on deck and taking some photos of the construction process on the unique bridge leading from the mainland to Russkiy Island along both sides of the Eastern Bosphorus channel.

The president himself launched construction of one of the biggest cable bridges in the world. More than 200,000 cubic metres of high quality cast-reinforced concrete have now been used in the structure of the bridge, 4,000 tonnes of metalwork have been used for the overpass, and 27 of a total of 33 supporting columns have been completed, while others are nearing completion. The 320-metre-high pylons on the Nasimov peninsula and on Russkiy Island are constantly gaining in height. The central span of the bridge will run between these pylons for 1,104 metres, which will be a record for world bridge construction.

Nazimov Peninsula

Russky Island

“I’m sure Vladivostok will have a brilliant future. That is why we are trying to make our beloved city more beautiful, more comfortable. And I want you to know this country’s position of our country: everything we are doing, including organizing major events such as the APEC summit in 2012, everything is being done not to deliver foreign policy success – this is, of course, also very important – but for you. To make Vladivostok even more beautiful, to make it the pride of our country!” Dmitriy Medvedev stressed in his congratulation speech to the citizens of Vladivostok.

After inspecting APEC summit facilities, the president headed off to the nuclear missile cruiser “Petr Velikiy” in the waters of the Eastern Bosphorus channel, in order to watch the “Vostok-2010″ military exercises taking place in the Far East. During the exercise, the president awarded honours to the crew of the anti-submarine warship “Marshal Shaposhnikov”, which took part in freeing the Russian oil tanker “Moskovskiy Universitet” from Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden.

Daniil Goncharuk / SK MOST


Photo by Igor Lyshchuk / SK MOST