London Millennium Bridge - Essay Example

London Millennium Bridge links the city of London with the Bankside. It’s a 330m steel bridge over the River Thames and is 330m long. It’s the first bridge that was built across the Thames River in London since the opening of the Tower Bridge (1894). Another special feature about the bridge is that is the first pedestrian-only bridge. The city is linked near St Paul's Cathedral with the Tate Modern art gallery on the Bankside. The bridge officially opened on 10th June 2000 and was immediately closed after being open for 2 days as it swayed alarmingly. The movement was not expected to be so great and this led to a lot of criticism of the project. Extensive research took place on the design and the bridge was reopened again after modifications to the original design on 22 February 2002. Since then it has not had any troubles and today is one of the major attractions of London attracting thousands of pedestrians and tourists every day. The Millennium Bridge is a simple concept that has been given shape via an extensive and complex design.
Findings of the Review
The review views the Bridge in 2 phases. The first phase is before the reopening of the bridge in 2002 (after numerous modifications were made) and the second is after the reopening immediately after the opening and the 2 years that it was closed. The review terms the first phase as a complete failure due to the following reasons:
• It did not meet the criteria of a successful project
• It was not completed on time
• It overshot the initial budget
• The final product was not of the best quality and had to be redesigned
• Extra funds had to be raised in order to do the modifications
The review terms the second phase as a success due to the following reasons:
• There is no wobbling and meets all the technical requirements
• It left up to the expectations
• It has contributed and generated revenue through tourism
• It has created jobs as it has opened up new business opportunities in the surrounding area
Even though the findings of the review are accurate and based on quality research, it does not take into consideration all the factors into consideration before terming it as an initial failure.
Yes, the fact that the engineers failed to come up with a design that could have predicted the wobbling and make necessary modifications cannot be ignored. But this kind of pedestrian effect on the bridge was unpredictable. As there hadn’t been any previous recordings that had caused such major effects (Zasky, 2011).
Also, there are numerous other factors that need to be considered. Prior to this, there hadn’t been much literature on the lateral vibration of a bridge. Even though there were numerous instances where lateral vibration was observed, it was not given much attention and hence was not incorporated into bridge-building codes (Newland, n.d.). Examples of other bridges that have registered lateral vibration are Auckland Harbour Road Bridge, Groves Suspension Bridge and Birmingham NEC Link Bridge.
The research that has gone into finding a solution for the problem has lead to the new literature on the topic and this will be used as a benchmark for all future projects. As mentioned above numerous other bridges, which are different in design and technology to that of London Millennium Bridge, that have vibrated due to the load of the crowd have come to light (Newland, 2003).
The project manager of the Bridge said, “As a result of what we have done here footbridges all over the world will be designed in a different way”. According to David Bell of Millennium Bridge Trust “The structure is probably the best known modern bridge in the world” (BBC, 2002).
The above statements make it clear that London Millennium Bridge is one of the best in the world. This has been possible only because of the initial defects in the design that lead to the wobbling. The solutions designed to overcome the wobbling has now made the bridge the best in the world and future bridges will use the findings of the research to build better bridges.
Hence, the initial defects cannot make the project a failure as in a long run it has contributed to developing the technology and design.