Europe's first plastics road bridge ready for traffic
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Composite plastics
Composite plastics: Europe's first plastics road bridge ready for traffic
 Europe’s first plastics bridge took less than a day to be installed. |
The first all-plastic bridge in Europe was installed recently near Friedberg, about 20 minutes north of Frankfurt. The carriageway slab of the bridge is made of fiberglass-reinforced polymer (FRP), which was glued onto two steel bearers. The bridge is 27m long by 5m wide, and weighs 80 tonnes. Able to support all types of vehicles, the bridge meets 2010 Eurocode standards—the new pan-European building code prepared by the European Commission for public construction. The bridge was prefabricated and then transported as a unit to the construction site, with total installation taking less than one day. The plastic bridge is expected to last up to 50 years without repairs.