Margaretengürtelbrücke

Winner of a 2010 international design competition, the 380m-long bridge at Margaretengürtel in Vienna was planned to link two urban parkland area to provide a pedestrian route across a busy traffic corridor. The project was paused following a change of city government and reallocation budget.

The linear form of the bridge design evolved from the landscape at each end and its massive minimalism stands in counterpoint to the rich architectural language of the neighbourhood, including the historic Margaretengürtel Station building by Otto Wagner.The design of the hybrid structure uses a glulam core of Spruce ‘lamella’ and a Larch outer layer to provide durability and good protection against moisture. The bending radii of the glulam layers are achieved using standard production techniques and areas of peak stresses are reinforced with threaded steel rods. The robust construction method is combined with the concept of a semi-integral bridge to reduce maintenance costs.

This innovative development of traditional timber building techniques is a graphic demonstration of elegant and environmentally responsible construction, being both a carbon sink and an efficient use of resources. Using a locally common building material with a low processing cost, it is estimated the superstructure would contain approximately 795t of stored CO2 within the 960m3 of wood and would use a fraction of the energy in construction of a concrete or steel bridge of the same span.