Briefing: French bridge

elegance and the future

Michel Virlogeux FICE, FIStructE
Associate, Michel Virlogeux Consultant SARL, Bonnelles, France
Innovative and elegant bridges such as the Pont de Normandie and Millau Viaduct may be the last of their kind
in France. This is due to a combination of reduced funding, growing environmental pressures, delegated design
responsibility and decreasing central government involvement.
Over the last 30 or 40 years, in France many elegant and
sometimes audacious bridges have been built which have been
considered as among the most beautiful and innovative in the
world. The author, however, is not sure that this will still be the
case in the future, as the situation has radically changed.
Limiting the analysis to the period of the authors own
professional activity, bridge construction was dominated in
the 1970s and 1980s by the French government on one side, and
by some innovative and audacious contractors Campenon
Bernard, Bouygues, Dragages et Travaux Publics on the other.
Not to mention the French railways, the SNCF, which were
more concerned with structural safety and operating conditions.
The French Highway Administration, and more specifically the
director of highways (mainly Michel Fe`ve and later Jean
Berthier), developed in the 1970s and 1980s a policy of innovation
and of architectural quality, with the strong support of the
technical service, the Setra, where the author had much liberty
under the direction of experienced and supportive engineers, such
as Marcel Huet, Maurice Lefranc, Jean Berthier and others. It
was possible to design arch bridges and cable-stayed bridges,
develop external prestressing and other innovative solutions, and
finally design the Normandie Bridge and the Millau Viaduct. At
the same time, the contracting companies had strong design teams
and brilliant engineers supported by their headquarters, such as
Jean Chaudesaigues, Jean Muller, Jacques Mathivat, Pierre
Richard and many others. They developed specific solutions
such as construction from precast segments, which is now
developed everywhere in the world and could take a decisive
part in the development of solutions initiated by the Setra, or in
their adaptation or transformation for a greater efficiency.
However, as already mentioned, times have changed radically.
Foremost, it should be noted that a large part of the necessary
infrastructure has now been built in our countries, and much
less will be built in the coming years. It is not necessary to add,
in these times of deep financial crisis, that the governments in
Europe have no more money for large projects. This point will
be addressed later.
The first two factors of the evolution come from the main
French actors, the French government and the contractors.
Since the beginning of the 1990s, the technical role of the French
government has been progressively reduced. Today the Setra does
not design bridges as it used to, and the local civil services, which
have been concentrated from the departements to the regions,
generally no longer have responsibility for site supervision and
have lost a large part of their corresponding capacities. Indeed,
the Setra has moved from the Paris area to a small village,
1?5 hours away, losing most of the experienced engineers. Some
local authorities departements or cities developed technical
services to replace the lost capacity, and private design offices
Setec, Egis, Arcadis and Ingerop developed their activities, but
could not fully replace what has disappeared.
Some medium-sized companies aside, the contractors are now
concentrated in three major groups Vinci, Bouygues and
Eiffage. They have lost a large part of their design offices and,
correspondingly, their leading engineers and part of their
technical competence. They frequently work as assemblers,
leaving a large part of the real work to subcontractors. However,
at the same time at least for the three majors they developed a
large and fruitful concession activity, and now have great
financial power; they work worldwide, with subsidiary compa-
nies in many countries, and are among the strongest in the world.
In this situation the design of bridges is now more or less
divided into two extreme situations. Isolated bridges and
relatively small projects are developed by local authorities
cities or departements and are generally designed after design
competitions completely dominated by architects. This fre-
quently leads to expensive, structurally inefficient and some-
times ridiculous bridges. Many of the French architects have
never passed the level of arch bridges. No technical progress,
no brilliant structure, can come from this.
Owing to the lack of governmental money, large projects,
which mainly concern high-speed railway tracks, are now
developed within concessions, or in a publicprivate process.
They are then developed in a completely opposite direction: the
Bridge Engineering
Volume 166 Issue BE1
Briefing: French bridge elegance and the
future
Virlogeux
Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers
Bridge Engineering 166 March 2013 Issue BE1
Pages 34 http://dx.doi.org/10.1680/bren.12.00007
Paper 1200007
Received 11/12/2010 Accepted 01/02/2012
Published online 22/11/2012
Keywords: bridges/government/infrastructure planning
ice
|
proceedings ICE Publishing: All rights reserved
3
lowest possible cost. Except for very rare occasions such as
for the Bacalan Bastide Bridge in Bordeaux no serious
consideration can be given to bridge architecture against cost
and erection efficiency.
As a final note, the authorities in charge of site protection
generally consider that a new bridge is in essence an obstacle,
and they push to design a bridge which is not seen. This is
impossible, and leads to very poor designs which degrade the
sites. The authorities help all those who want to interfere and to
change the design, generally for the worse, to a more ordinary
one, losing the initial unity and elegance. This is why the author
fears that the French bridges built in the years to come will not
have the elegance of those erected these last 30 or 40 years, and
that his successors will not be invited to write about them.
The authors strong conviction is that a country cannot
develop a policy of innovation and of architectural quality
without a strong and qualified administration, supported by
the governmental authorities.
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Bridge Engineering
Volume 166 Issue BE1
Briefing: French bridge
elegance and the future
Virlogeux
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