PRINCIPAL KEYNOTE SPEAKER, Day 1

Jean Muller, ME (Ecole Centrale de Paris)

Jean Muller is the founder and Honorary Chairman of Jean Muller International. He has a Masters
Degree in Structural Engineering from the Ecole Centrale de Paris and is the disciple of Eugene
Freyssinet, the father of modern prestressed concrete. From 1948 to 1952 he was priveleged to
work with Freyssinet in some outstanding projects, including the bridges over the Marne River in
France and the arch bridges in Caracas, Venezuela.

From 1952 to 1955 he was assigned to New York to develop prestressed concrete designs and
technologies in the USA and, while there, worked on the large 38 km long Pontchartrain Bridge in
Louisiana.

From 1956 to 1977 he worked with Campenon Bernard, a leading general contractor in France, as
their Technical Director. During that period he developed a number of innovative structural
concepts and technologies, including the now universal precast segmental system (1962), first used
in the Choisy-le-Roi Bridge over the River Seine. As their principal designer, he created some 35
bridges in Paris, including the Aval, B3 Sud, Saint Cloud, Courbevoie and Amont bridges. His
projects expanded throughout France with bridges such as Oleron, Blois, Pierre Benite, St Andre
de Cubzac, Area viaducts, RER Torcy and the AREA Overpasses.

He worked as senior designer on overseas bridge projects such as the viaduct of Chillon in
Switzerland, the Sallingsund bridge in Denmark, the F9 viaduct in Melbourne and the Rio-Niteroi
Link in Brazil. In total these projects amounted to over 650 thousand square meters of bridge
deck area and US $1 billion in construction costs. During this period some of his other
innovations included the development of launching gantries, the method of short cells, the single
plane of stays in the Brotonne bridge and the use of strands for cable stays.

Between 1978 and 1987 Jean Muller founded the Figg and Muller engineering company in the
USA. During this period he designed some of the largest bridge structures in North America
including the Florida Keys, the Seven Mile Bridge, the cable stayed bridge of Sunshine Skyway in
Tampa with their record span of 360 m, the Houston Ship Channel bridge with a record span of
250 m, the San Antonio Y, the Linn Cove Viaduct, the Wando River bridge and the cable stayed

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bridges of James River, Netches River, Clark River, C & D Canal, a total of 25 bridges, 950
thousand square metes of deck area and an asset value of some US$900 million. He was first to
develop external post-tensioning, dry joints, delta frames, top-down construction and numerous
other bridge concepts.

J.Muller International was founded in 1987. Since then Mr Muller has designed numerous large
projects - the H3 Viaducts in Hawai, the Second Expressway, BTS and Bang Na bridges in
Bangkok, the cable-stayed bridges of Isere, Santa Rosa, Las Americas, the Ceremonial Bridge
(1000 metres), the suspension cable bridge of Chavanon (300 m), the Confederation bridge in
Canada and more recently the 500m Ravenel bridge for which five different structural schemes
were proposed. During this period he designed over 25 outstanding bridges with an area of 4.5
million square meters and a total worth of US$4.2 billion.

He developed the bi-stayed concept for spans over 1000 meters, the delta frame for twin box
cable-stayed bridges, precast segmental piers, the swivel crane plus launching gantry assembly
system, the post-tensioned steel space truss, the channel section bridge and other innovations too
numerous to mention.

Numerous awards and prizes have been bestowed upon him including the Golden Eiffel Award,
the FIP Freyssinet medal, the Benjamin Franklin Institute Award, the Fritz Schumacher Prize and
the Albert Caquot Prize. Many of the bridges he has designed over the years have also won
citations and awards. He is the author of numerous papers and co-author of a treatise on segmental
bridges.

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 Segmental Bridge Technology at the Turn of the 21st Century

Jean Muller
Bridge Consultant

SYNOPSIS

In the relentless endeavor for technical improvement, engineers may be able to anticipate the
future by looking over their past and by reassessing their experiences, successes and failures.
Some developments, which will emerge during the next century, are already in different
stages of germination. Others are unknown and will elude any forecast. Both will bring,
eventually, solutions to the problems we are unable to solve today.

With over 50 years of my life in the business of design and of construction of bridges, I will
analyze for you the essence of my experience and try to project it into the future, by
imagining how bridges will be conceived, designed, built, financed and maintained and how
new constraints and developments will revaluate the significance of bridges in our societies
and therefore, reshape our own profession.

1. BACKGROUND

Bridges were built since mankind started moving. We lost all trace of bridges from those
early ages but it is evident that they existed. The origins of bridge building, as we understand
it today, starts with the Romans. Their empire, that stretched from England and Portugal to
the Middle East and Persia, was based on an extraordinary network of roads and bridges.
Masters in the art of bridge building, they used stone as their preferred material, for its
durability and resistance.

They developed the technology of construction of arches with stone "voussoirs" that was
never surpassed. More than 1000 years ago, they built bridges, masterpieces that still today
are lessons of ingenuousity and beauty. I will just mention two of them, both built in France,
the Pont du Gard at Nimes and the Pont d'Avignon over the Rhone. The "bridge-engineers"
who built such marvels were highly respected as they were supposed to hold some divine gift.

Stone, the construction material by excellence, was further pushed to its limits of strength and
of structural elegance, by the masters-masons that built our gothic cathedrals. There, a deep
knowledge of statics and of the behavior of stone, created those aerial structures that reached
absolute engineering perfection. Aware of their power, these builders protected jealously
their profession, under strict corporate rules that avoided the dissipation of their know-how.
They played in their societies a much wider role than the one engineers are expected to play.
Today we may learn something from them.

For almost 700 years after the Romans, stone remained the only reliable and durable material
for bridge construction. During this long period, the technology of bridge building did
improve, but not as fast as other specialties. I will mention the Ponte Vecchio (1345) in
Florence, the Rialto Bridge (1590) in Venice, the Pont Neuf (1607) and the Pont Royal 1687)
in Paris. It took 7 centuries to go from spans of 20 metres to spans of 40 metres.

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 As they improved their craftsmanship, blocks of stone were pre-cut to precise dimensions so
that once in the structure, the matching faces at joints between any two numbered units would
fit perfectly. They laid the basis for what we call today the segmental match cutting
technology.

By the end of the 1700's and during the next century, cast iron challenged the dominance of
stone. It's acceptance was nevertheless confined to England and to US as some major bridge
failures, caused by the brittleness of the material, limited its use. However, by the middle of
the nineteenth century, steel emerged as a wonder material for bridge construction. That
invention, in 1850, marked the end of stone in bridge engineering.

The most astonishing development in bridge construction then took place in the United States
(with steel arch and truss bridges) and in the UK with truss cantilever bridges (such as the
Firth of Forth Bridge, Edinburgh, with its record spans of 510 metres). By the beginning of
the 20th century, the suspension bridges in the United States, in particular under the leadership
of the extraordinary engineer John Roebling, pushed the limits of bridge spans to 1000 and
more metres. For 700 years bridge spans increased from 20 to 40 metres and then, in less
then a century, jumped to 1200 metres with the Golden Gate, in San Francisco, that opened in
1937. Considering its unique lines and the majesty of its location, it remains the most
impressive bridge of all time.

In Europe, in the meantime, another brilliant engineer was developing a new avenue in the
field of bridge construction. It happened in France and he was Eugene Freyssinet. He built
concrete arches and pushed concrete into unchartered waters by building such remarkable
structures as Plougastel, shell hangars and the bridges over the Marne River. These bridges,
which were a prelude to the development of precast segmental construction, left a lasting
impression on me when I was exposed to its construction. Then he invented, what he called,
not just another material, but a new way to built - prestressed concrete.

This was the incomparable heritage of the first half of the century that we received from our
predecessors, when during the decade of the 50's, as a young engineer, I started working for
Freyssinet.

2. BIRTH AND GROWTH OF PRECAST SEGMENTAL CONSTRUCTION

After working in some quite interesting projects with Eugene Freyssinet, such as the arch
bridges in the La Guaira -Caracas expressway, where the genius of the master was quite
apparent, (for instance in the way he conceived the formwork for the arches), I was assigned
to Freyssinet, New York, to support the effort of introducting prestressed concrete to the
United States.

Among other projects, two are very important in my career:

■ The Pontchartrain Bridge, where I discover the massive industrialization of a bridge
project, of the scale of the country and of course, the amazing efficiency of the
American way to do things.
■ The Shelton bridge, in New York, a small single span bridge where, for the first time
I conceived the construction of the beams by precasting them in segments using
match cast dry joints, and assembling at the site with post-tensioned cables. It was
done so fast and easily that nobody noticed it. The bridge is still there today.

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After these experiences I returned to France to work for Campenon Bernard, a general
contractor that had acquired the Freyssinet patents. I also worked in other types of projects
such as large concrete dams and marine work. But the Shelton bridge experience did come
back to my mind from time to time.

2.1 Decades of the 60's and 70's

It was only in 1962 that I had the opportunity to proceed further with that experience. The
project that offered the conditions for a new development was the Choisy-le-Roi Bridge over
the Seine River, in Paris. We won the contract by presenting a design and construction
solution as an alternative to the original design. In this bridge precast segmental box girder
technology with match casting and epoxy coated joints was used for the first time. It was a
very successful project in terms of quality and speed of construction. The bridge was
assembled using cantilever construction and a floating crane.

Following that success numerous other projects were won the same way in France, as design
an built projects:
■ Bridges built using cantilever construction at Oleron and St. Andre
• Bridges built by progressive placing at Fontennoy and Neyrolles
■ Cable-stayed bridges at Brotonne
These accomplishments subsequently interested clients outside France. We were involved in
the Chillon viaduct project in Lausanne, Switzerland, the Rio de Janeiro-Niteroi Link in
Brazil, the Sallingsund Bridge in Denmark and in the F9 Freeway in Melbourne.

2.2 First wave of innovations

The development of these design and built projects put a lot of pressure on our team as the
construction site was constantly requesting solutions for their new construction problems
from the design office. These pressures generated a considerable amount of innovative
systems, equipment and products that were tested almost immediately at the site of the next
project.

Of these innovations those worthy of mention include multiple shear keys, epoxy coated
joints, long line and short line precasting, different types of launching girders for cantilever
construction, erection of segments using the beam and winch method and the swivel crane,
the single pylon and central stay-cable system, the precast multicell box girder and so on.
These innovations covered almost all types of bridge projects currently developed in Europe.

3. DEVELOPMENTS IN THE UNITED STATES

Since my first assignment to New York, I frequently visited the United States and, from time
to time, tried to see if the Americans were ready to consider other types of bridges rather than
the dominant AAHSTO beams in the South or the steel beams in the North. It was quite
striking for Europeans visiting American cities, to see how little importance owners placed on
the aesthetics of bridges and to discover that they were exclusively concerned about cost,
independently of anything else.

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3.1 Decade of the 80's

The situation start changing by the end of the 70's. We were fortunate to get the first design
contract in 1978 for the design of the Long Keys Bridge, south of Florida. However, it is one
thing is to get a design contract; the other is to interest contractors bidding for the project to
present an offer on an alternative to the base design that used AASHTO beams. By
introducing a considerable number of innovations in the Long Keys project and adapting the
segmental technology developed in France for the American contractors, we were able to
interest the best of them and our project was the winner.

The rapid development of segmental technology in the United States was quite surprising as
in less than 8 years almost all large bridge projects in the Eastern States adopted such
alternatives. The most interesting projects were:

■ span-by-span bridges such as the Florida Keys

■ cantilever precast such as Dauphine Island and Wando
■ cantilever cast-in-situ, such as the Houston Ship Channel
▪ railway bridges, such as the Marta viaduct and the Escambia bridge
■ progressive placing, as in the Linn Cove Viaduct
■ cable-stayed bridges as in the Sunshine Skyway, James River and C&D Canal

Even if these projects were prepared for Government agencies, the process of selection of
consultants and the fact that, in general, there are frequently two competing designs offered to
the contractors, forced us to continue in our effort of introducing innovative solutions and
adapting the experience acquired in France to the specific market condition of the United
States.

3.2 Second wave of innovations

For us the first project in the United States was the decisive test. We had to make a drastic
revision of the segmental box girder concept to compete and to beat the AASHTO beams that
had very strong local support and a well-established industry. Amongst the innovations
introduced in that project were external post-tensioning, dry joints, span-by-span
construction, the use of precast V-piers, transverse pretensloning of the top slab and the use
of diabolos at the deviation of the external cables. The project cost was optimized to the
extreme.

Other innovations were developed during the design of Linn Cove to allow the construction
of foundations without using any access roads, using the top-down construction method with
precast segmental piers and, for the James River Bridge, an innovative delta-frame that
allowed us to built the approaches and the main cable-stayed span using the same twin boxes.

4. WORLDWIDE EXPANSION

To develop our concepts further, in 1986 we decided to create a different organization, one
oriented towards design and built and to BOT projects in the international market. As the
world was changing and accelerating towards a global market, we wanted to reassess our
experience acquired first in France, then in the United States, and go a step further towards
the world market.

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Our aims were to bring new solutions to the challenges of bridge builders:
■ Reduce time and cost of construction by deeply integrating structural design with the
design of construction methods, both developed by the same team
■ Consider seriously the environmental concerns that are blocking the construction of
much needed bridges
■ Develop new ways to built bridges in extreme weather conditions, where future
bridges may be built
■ Improve the aesthetics and the durability of segmental bridges to reach the 100 years
life requirement
■ Adapt the technology to solve huge transportation problems in developing cities

4.1 Decade of the 90's

Some of the projects accomplished during this period are so large that, sometimes, we
wonder how they were built so fast and without problems. The scale now is even larger than
in the United States because the needs and urgency are quite different. We are trying, better
than in the past, to customize our technologies and to integrate, as smooth as possible, the
projects into their environment. This is the third generation of segmental bridges, in which
designs are:

■ Blending with mountains and forests. This was our objective when designing the H3
and the Kaneohe viaducts in Honolulu, Hawaii, or when we conceived the Rogerville
viaduct through one of the most beautiful forests in France.

■ Flying over valleys and canyons with elegance and transparency. It was required in
such projects as the Chavanon suspension cable bridge and the cable-stayed bridge of
Isere, both in France, or the Bras de la Pleine, in the La Reunion Island.

■ Crossing very quickly a hostile strait. It was imperative in the Confederation bridge
project, between the Prince Edward Island and mainland Canada.

■ Building very long viaducts for light rail, crossing the most crowded areas of the
cities, without disturbing existing traffic

■ Building in record time, very large urban expressways, using the minimum right of
way and allowing full standardization and industrialization of the superstructures.

4.2 Third wave of innovations

This third wave of innovative concepts developed under the pressure of international design
and build projects, or under the heavy constraints of BOT projects, and was produced using
the new technologies of communication, connecting three continents and mobilizing
engineers from 25 different origins. We are already testing future business environments that
will mark the 2l century.

One of these innovations is a construction system that incorporates a sophisticated launching

gantry, allowing the construction of twin viaducts, with different geometries, to be built
simultaneously using the balanced cantilever method at record speeds.

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The other is a system for the erection of a 6-lane box girder with a launching gantry that
moves itself, between the arms of the piers, and carries a swivel crane that can pick up
segments from the ground or from the viaduct already built. Numerous innovative structural
concepts were developed for the Confederation Bridge. We will mention just one, a precast,
match-cast template that allowed the erection of the 8000 ton main girder over the pier,
almost instantaneously.

For light rail viaducts, a system integrating the station around the segmental main line was
developed with success in Monterrey and for the cable-stayed station of Santo Amaro. The
use of steel space trusses is being developed for large span cable-stayed bridges. We are
using external post-tensioning in these trusses. These innovative concepts are subject to
further developments as we have followed closely the construction of all these projects and
can see room for improvement.

5. STATE-OF-THE-ART TECHNOLOGY INTO THE 21st CENTURY

These three phases of the development of segmental technology - the French phase, the
American phase and the world-wide phase, give us an enormous amount of information about
some 100 bridges built during a 40 years period, in five continents, under the most diverse
contractual schemes, by a team of engineers whose core remained unchanged.

Now that we are entering a new century during which, as we can already perceive, changes
will come faster and will affect all markets, we are considering other forms of development
as we think that our role in the societies, as bridge engineers or just as engineers, is going to
be quite different from the one we played during the different phases of this development.

Will the extraordinary growth that segmental technology experienced during the last decade
going to accelerate or to slow down? Is the privatisation of infrastructure going to expand, in
which case industrialization will follow its growth, or will privatization be delayed in
developing countries and in particular the South-East Asian markets?

Our team acquired high visibility when our proposal was selected by the White House,
amongst thousands of other project proposals, to develop a bridge using state-of-the-art
materials, such as carbon fibre, that the US defense industry produces for space and aircraft
applications. We see these new materials, sometime during the next decade, being integrated
into the construction process of complex bridges. Other materials, less glamorous, such as
super-resistant concrete, fibre-reinforced concrete, super resistant cables, etc. may come
sooner to our construction sites.

We are already working on concept designs that are ready to incorporate these new materials
as, for instance, the channel bridge and space trusses with modular assembly and external
post-tensioning.

Durability will become a major concern of owners as privatization progresses. The 100 year
service life requirement will, one day, oblige somebody to give a warranty. This may
drastically change the way bridges are now built. We know, from our own 25 year
experience with precast segmental and cast-in-situ segmental construction, that maintenance
costs and durability may be quite different, even when bridges are designed by the same
consultant and built by the same contractor. We also know that external post-tensioning and

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the improvements for its replaceability and easy inspection, constitute a much more reliable
system then the traditional internal post-tensioning systems. Are these realities going to be
accepted by the owners?

Bridges will become intelligent by introducing into their structures hydraulics or other
equipment that will be programmed to react under special loading conditions. We have
implemented this in a large cantilever bridge using hydraulic jacks in the sliding hinge.

There will also be considerable developments in the field of very large cable-stayed spans,
using a system that we invented and patented. Called the "bi-stayed" bridge, it combines the
concept of the common cable-stayed bridge and anchoring the longest stays in anchor blocks,
independent of the stayed deck. The concept may extend the spans of cable-stayed bridges
up to 3000 meters.

The industrialization of bridges, contrary to what some people may think, does not preclude
engineers from being creative and developing bridges like fashion designers develop dresses -
bridges that are one-of-a-type and are specially tailored for the location, for the event, or for a
client. These are "signature" bridges, beautiful, unique and unforgettable. We are seeing
more and more of these bridges, improving the landscape of our cities and of our
expressways.

Bridges must be what they are expected to represent: monuments of our times, ways that
open new horizons and new hopes, that develop interchange and understanding, that generate
wealth and peace. But, above all, bridges should be "works of art".

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