Forestry England Temporary Bridge Design

R Vint Engineering was asked to design a temporary bridge for Forestry England, specifically Yorkshire Forest District, when they were looking to improve the versatility of their existing temporary bridge stock for future projects to allow for currently inaccessible timber parcels to be unlocked.
Forestry England had an existing bridge design for a 6m span steel bridge. The segmental nature of this bridge allowed for simple installation of the structure in difficult to access sites.
This design was required to be adapted to meet the required specification as outlined below.
• Clear Span: 8m
• Effective Span: 9m
• Running Surface Width: 4.5m – single carriageway width
• Kerbs – as per ‘FCE-9903-01 Temporary Bridge Units 6m span 4.5m wide’
• Galvanised steel handrail – 1.2m above deck height
• Loading – BS EN 1991 -2 LM1 – to cover 44t mgw vehicles
• Maximum segment weight: 3t. This was critical to ensure the bridge could be installed without the necessity for a crane.