Cover Picture: Steel Construction 4/2010

The Ravine Fontaine is one of four high bridges on the recently constructed Route de Tamarins highway. Réunion Island is a French territory located east of Madagascar Island in the Indian Ocean. The viaduct was constructed between 2007 and 2009. The deck, 200 m long by 20.1 m wide, is a mixed steel/reinforced concrete structure. The steel framing is formed by a pair of longitudinal box girders having a height just above 1 m by 2 m in width, spaced out at 8 m centers. The longitudinal box girders are connected between each other and stiffened with “T” sections spaced out at circa 4 m centers. The box girders also form a surface for supporting the pre‐cast deck elements necessary for casting the reinforced concrete deck. The arch, which develops over a length of approximately 170 m, is formed from a steel box girder of varying height with continuity from the abutment, where the height is greater than 5 m and the mean width circa 2.6 m, up to the arch ridge, where the box flattens out and becomes 1 m high by 10 m wide. Total tonnage: 2000 tons (see pp. 251).