New Zealand's Bridges: Sloan Avenue (Gillespie) Footbridge across the Heathcote River in Christchurch

March 2011 (-43.569 Degrees, 172.639 Degrees) Sloan Avenue Bridge

Another damaged footbridge across the Heathcote River. My hosts from the University of Canterbury, Simone and Alessandro are standing on the bridge. 

I like the big round piers on each side of the river. They support a prestressed concrete T girder main span and side spans that descend to the ground. During the earthquake, the two piers moved closer together which cracked open the  top of the main span at the ends (see figure below). 

They put up tape to stop people from using the bridge, which apparently wasn't a very effective disincentive for people needing to cross the river.

New Zealand's Bridges: Sloan Avenue (Gillespie) Footbridge across the Heathcote River in Christchurch by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.