Bridge_Project

A dancing bridge for the city of tango. A couple dancing tango, the man holds the woman who is horizontally extended. A shape that transpires sensuality, just like tango. This is what the valencian architect Santiago Calatrava thought, while listening to tango, for the bridge asked to build in Buenos Aires by Alberto González, member of the group madero. This bridge is the first and unique project of Calatrava in Latin America, and it's specifically located in Buenos Aires, Argentina, at Dock three at Puerto Madero. All the streets in the area of Puerto Madero make a tribute to women work in the society by being named after famous women, that's the reason why the name of this bridge is "Puente de la mujer". The architect's concept of the dancing tango couple is not reflected just in the form of the bridge; also in its structure we can see his concept. The vertically inclined arm represents the man of the couple, which supports through the wires to the woman. This bridge is a cantilever spar cable-stayed bridge, a variety of a cable-stayed bridge that reaches toward the cable supported deck and is counterbalanced by a structural tail. It also has another innovation, it is split in three sections and it allows one of them, the central one, to rotate up to 90° on a mobile pylon cone in less than two minutes to let the boats pass through, while the ones on both sides keep fixed. This central section is supported by a steel needle with the soul of cement of about 39 meters in height. The needle is ready to hang it diagonally, like a suspension bridge, the cables that support the stretch turn. "Puente de la mujer" is a pedestrian bridge, it has 160 meters long and 6.20 meters wide, and saves the separation made by the river between the Dock three in Puerto Madero and Alicia Moreau de Justo avenue. It's oriented from east to west It weighs 800 tons. The fixed lateral sections are 25 and 32.50 meters long and the central section 102.50 meters. Each platform has one foundation made out of reinforced concrete. To operate the twist it has a computer system located on the east of the bridge. Calatrava created an extraordinary architectural piece with "Puente de la mujer", but he went further, he gave an icon to the city of Buenos Aires, he felt the Argentinean culture and made a sculture that not only connects both sides of the river but connects every Argentinean with his culture.

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