Port Phillip Bay Bridge

Port Phillip Bay Bridge, Victoria, Australia is a proposal of linking Queenscliff and Sorrento via a bridge and therefore eliminating the need of a ferry as the only way of transport across the waterway. While not a serious proposition at the moment, it has been proposed as a means of improving linkages between two of the growth areas in Victoria, Geelong and the Bellarine Peninsula on one side and the Mornington Peninsula on the other.[1]

Such a bridge would need to span a 3.4 kilometre stretch of water known as "The Rip" between Queenscliff and Portsea in order to connect the Bellarine Highway and the Mornington Peninsula Freeway. The current longest suspension bridge is the Akashi Kaikyo Bridge in Japan, with a length of its longest span of 1,991m.[2] This would make the proposed bridge the bridge with the longest central span of any suspension bridges in the world ever, if it were to be built as a suspension bridge.[3]

However the shortest link being the 3.4 km route is totally out of the question as it encroaches on the highly unstable and sensitive tip of Point Nepean, even if a tunnel were to be used instead

From the Preliminary Proposal put forward by David Broadbent in March 1998, there were 10 possible crossing evaluated. Out of these 10 only 1 was considered to be viable.

Based on this preferred crossing the Bridge would have a landfall to landfall distance of 5 km with a main span of 2.5 km. The air draft of the bridge was calculated to need 70 metres.

References

  1. ↑ [Ostrow, Steven, 1997, Bridges, London: Threshold Books Ltd NOEL MURPHY: Bridge too far ... maybe not November 27th, 2009 Geelong Advertiser ]
  2. ↑ Ostrow, Steven, 1997, Bridges, London: Threshold Books Ltd
  3. ↑ Transport Problem: Negotiating Port Phillip Bay Adapted from a first year civil engineering report – this report was an exercise in brainstorming alternatives, RMIT Engineering Faculty

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