Taking high speed rail to border

Longest viaduct on this section of Spain’s AVE railway lines

Spain’s AVE line from Barcelona to the French border nears completion with the construction of the 835 m long Rio Fluvià Viaduct. The BBR Network developed post-tensioning for this - and three other viaducts - which complete this section of the high speed railway line. The BBR VT CONA CMI system was used for all four viaducts.

The Rio Fluvià Viaduct is a box girder bridge consisting of 14 spans with lengths ranging from 45 m to 70 m. To improve distribution of the PT forces, ten tendons with 31 strands and stressing anchorages in both ends were used for the longitudinal tendons running along the webs of the box.
The other three viaducts - Cinyana and Casinyola 1 & 2 – featured concrete lightened slab decks and were constructed using a moveable scaffold system.
Special PT tendons - with adjustable anchorages to join the abutments to the decks - were used on all the viaducts to counteract the braking forces of high speed trains.