12 December 2012 - Sydney Harbour Bridge - Australia

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"Ladies and gentlemen. This is the Captain speaking. Look to your right and you will see the mighty Sydney Harbour Bridge in all its glory. Enjoy your flight ... with the 'flying kangaroo' ... the spirit of Australia'

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SYDNEY HARBOUR BRIDGE

AUSTRALIA

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G'day guys,

Well, I guess that's exactly what the captain would have said as he flew across Sydney harbour. Today I introduce another amazing structure in the world. It's a bridge crudely nicknamed the 'coat hangar'. The Sydney Harbour Bridge was opened on March 19th 1932 by Premier Jack Lang, after six years of construction. Made of steel the bridge contains 6 million hand driven rivets. The surface area that requires painting is equal to about the surface area of 60 sports fields. The Bridge has huge hinges to absorb the expansion caused by the hot Sydney sun. You will see them on either side of the bridge at the footings of the Pylons.

You can have a close hand look while you are in Sydney by visiting the South Eastern Pylon. It is a walking trip and recommended for the fit only. It is a longish walk to get to the base of the Pylon and then there are 200 steps to the top.

The views and photo opportunities are fantastic. (If you can make it, we've got to say it is tough). There is a great display on how the thing was built. It has a similar place in Sydney history to the Statue of Liberty in New York as far as many migrants to Australia go. In sight of the bridge you knew you had made it.

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The displaced peoples of Europe who came to Australia in the days of the grand ships can get very misty when you ask them what they felt when they saw this grand old arch on their arrival in Sydney from the aftermath of World War Two as they sailed up Port Jackson (Sydney Harbour). The old Bridge has been replaced as "the" landmark of Sydney by the bold architecture of the Opera House.

But a grand old bridge it is, and one you will remember whenever you think of Sydney after your visit.

When it opened it cost a car six pence to cross. A horse and rider was 3 pence. These days a return trip (for some reason the only kind) costs two dollars twenty (gst). Horses and riders are banned, that's the changing times. You can walk across free and you are allowed to bicycle in a special lane.

Sydney Harbour Bridge is the world's largest (but not longest as that's the New River Gorge in the USA) steel arch bridge, and, in its beautiful harbour location, has become a renowned international symbol of Australia.

Its total length including approach spans is 1149 metres and its arch span is 503 metres. The top of the arch is 134 metres above sea level and the clearance for shipping under the deck is a spacious 49 metres. The total steelwork weighs 52,800 tonnes, including 39,000 tonnes in the arch. The 49 metre wide deck makes Sydney Harbour Bridge the widest Longspan Bridge in the world.

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The cranes had played a very important part in both the construction and ongoing maintenance of the bridge. During construction of the main arch between 1929 and 1931, two huge creeper cranes moved outwards, laying their tracks as they progressed. Behind them moved the four maintenance cranes, used initially by the riveting and painting gangs until they had to be dismantled to allow the creeper cranes to pass by and be removed in pieces near the pylons. The maintenance cranes were then re-erected on the arch and remained in service until their removal in 1997.

Traffic:

Annual average daily traffic has since grown to:

1950                 32,000 vehs/day

2001                 159,597 vehs/day

(NB: Harbour Tunnel opened 31st August 1992)

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Now, here is a slide video that will show you the bridge's construction in some detail:

Sydney Harbour Bridge

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Clancy's comment: I take my hat off to the engineers who create such constructions. By the way, Paul Hogan of 'Crocodile Dundee' fame, was a painter on this bridge before he became famous.

I'm ...

17 November 2012 - The Eiffel Tower - Paris

Copyright Clancy Tucker (c)

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Quote of the day:

"If you love something set it free.

If it comes back it is yours,

if it doesn’t it never was."

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The Eiffel Tower

- Paris, France -

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G'day guys,

Today I bring you an amazing structure that I found gob smacking when I first saw it - The Eiffel Tower.

Eiffel Tower (Tour Eiffel in French), originally named tower 330 meters (330 meters tour) is a puddling iron structure designed by French engineer Gustave Eiffel and his staff for the 1889 Universal Exposition in Paris.
Located in the Campo de Marte by the river Seine, this Parisian monument, symbol of France and its capital, was the ninth most visited country in 2006 and the first most visited monument in the world with 6,893,000 visitors in 2007. With a height of 300 meters, extended later with an antenna on 325 meters, the Eiffel Tower was the highest building in the world for over 40 years.

It was built in two years, two months and five days in a dispute with the artists of the time, that looked like a monster of iron. Originally used for scientific experiments, today is, in addition to tourist attractions, such as issuing of radio and television programs.

Initially the subject of some controversy, the Eiffel Tower served as an introduction to the Paris Universal Exhibition of 1889, which welcomed more than 236 million visitors since its opening. Its exceptional size and its instantly recognizable silhouette of the tower became a symbol of Paris.

Conceived in the imagination of Maurice Koechlin and Emile Nouguier, head of the office of studies and head of office methods, respectively, of the "Eiffel and Co.," was thought to be the "nail (focus) of the 1889 exhibition to be held in Paris, which also celebrate the centenary of the French Revolution. The first level of the tower was made in June 1884 and improved by Stephen Sauvestre, the main architect of the projects of the company, who brought over aesthetics.

On May 1, 1886, the Minister of Trade and Industry, Edouard Lockroy, enthusiastic supporter of the project, signed a decree declaring open "a support for the Universal Exhibition of 1889. Gustave Eiffel won this financial support and an agreement on January 8, 1887 which set the modalities of construction of the building.

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Built from 1887 to 1889 for 250 workers, will be officially opened on March 31, 1889. Often suffer corrosion, the Eiffel Tower does not really know a massive success and continued until the sixties, with the development of international tourism. Now host to over six million visitors each year.

Its 300 meters in height allowed him to take the title of "the tallest structure in the world until the construction in 1930 of the Chrysler Building in New York. Built on the Champ de Mars near the river Seine in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, is currently administered by the Society for the administration of the Eiffel Tower "(Société d'exploitation of the Tour Eiffel, SETE). The site, which employs 500 people (250 employees and 250 of the SETE different dealers installed on the monument) is open every day of the year.

Conceived in 1884, built between 1887 and 1889 and inaugurated for the Universal Exhibition of 1889 in Paris, the Eiffel Tower symbolizes today in the entire country, France.  However, it was not always so. The Eiffel Tower was part of the country's economic showcase.  Since 1875, the nascent Third Republic, which was marked by chronic political instability, could hardly sustain. In government, political parties are occurring at a steady pace. According to Léon Gambetta, is often made by ministers as "opportunistic", but a legislator whose work laid the stones of the principles still applicable in the present compulsory school, secularism, freedom of the press, etc.

But the society of the day puts even more emphasis on technical progress and social progress. It is this faith in the benefits of science that gave rise to the world fair. But from the first exposure (Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations [Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations], London, 1851), the rulers perceive quickly putting that behind there is a technological showcase policy, and it would be a mistake not to seize the opportunity. Demonstrating its industry expertise, the host shows your progress and superiority over other European powers, who then reigned over the world. Under this view, France hosts the World Exposition repeatedly in the years 1855, 1867 and 1878. Jules Ferry, President of the Council from 1883 to 1885, decided to revive the idea of a universal exhibition in France. On November 8, 1884, signed a decree formally establishing the holding of a Universal Exposition in Paris from May 5 to October 31, 1889. The year was not chosen at random, because it symbolizes the centennial of the French Revolution. Paris is once again the center of the world. Although the New World side of things is changing rapidly and across the Atlantic, within the economic power of the young United States of America where truly born the idea of a tower 300 meters.

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Indeed, at the Universal Exhibition in Philadelphia in 1876, American engineers and Clark Reeves, imagine a project of a cylindrical post 9 meters in diameter by spstenido shrouds metal anchored to a circular base of 45 meters in diameter, with a total height of 300 meters. For lack of credit, your project will never see the light, although it would be published in France in the journal Nature.

In the same situation, the French engineer Sébillotte draws in the United States, the idea of a 'sun tower' of iron alumbraría Paris. To do so, it joins with the architect Jules Bourdais, who worked on the project of the Palace of the Trocadéro to the Universal Exhibition of 1878. Together, they designed a "beacon tower of granite, 300 meters high and know several versions, which will compete with the proposed tower Gustave Eiffel, and finally, never be built.

In June 1884, two engineers of the company Eiffel, Maurice Koechlin and Emile Nouguier, head of the project office and the head of office methods, respectively, study the project of a metal tower of 300 meters. They hope to make it the focus of the Exhibition of 1889.
On June 6 exactly, Maurice Koechlin made the first sketches of the building. The drawing represents a 300 meter tall tower, where the four sides are connected by curved platforms every 50 meters until you reach the summit. Gustave Eiffel says not interested in the project, however, gives the designer the authority to proceed with the study.

Stephen Sauvestre, chief architect of the Eiffel company is called to collaborate in the project and completely re-draw the building to give it another scale: adds a heavy foot masonry tower and connects to the first floor through arches, reduces the number platforms from five to two, makes the design of the tower something like a lighthouse, among other changes.

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This new version of the project, embellished with a decorative coating is presented back to Gustave Eiffel, who on this occasion, is enthusiastic about the project, so that deposited on September 18, 1884, on behalf of the Koechlin and Nouguier, a patent for "a new provision that allows the construction of batteries and metal towers with a height exceeding 300 meters. Soon after buying the rights of Koechlin and Nouguier to obtain exclusive rights on future tower that will soon bear his name.

Gustave Eiffel's genius lies not in the design of the monument, but the energy expended to make your project known to the rulers, and those responsible for the general public, to build the tower, and when he succeeded in investment to do that in the eyes of all, still a challenge arquitectoral simple and purely technical or an aesthetic object (or unaesthetic others). Also financed with their own scientific experiments carried on or from the Eiffel Tower, which helped perpetuate it.

First, try to convince Édouard Lockroy, Minister of Trade and Industry, then, to launch a competition aimed at "exploring the possibility of raising the Champ de Mars in an iron tower with a base of 125 m² a height of 300 meters. The modalities of this contest, in May 1886, both seem to project championed by Gustave Eiffel which could almost believe it was written in his own hand. Of course, Eiffel did not, but it is clear that your project has great potential to be chosen to appear on the Universal Exhibition to be held three years later. It has yet to demonstrate that it is an object that is purely decorative, but can perform other functions. By putting everything in front of the scientific interest in the tower, you get some doubt in their favor.

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Eiffel does not know in advance the outcome of the contest. Competition becomes fierce. 107 projects were submitted, but ultimately Gustave Eiffel won the competition, allowing him to build his tower for the Exposition Universelle of 1889, as did Jules Bourdais, who will do yours with Trocadéro Palace, who instead of using iron, preferred granite.

Below are two problems: the elevator that does not meet the selection board, forcing Eiffel to change supplier, and location of the monument. Initially, it is putting the building right next to the Seine, or beside the Old Palace of the Trocadero (now the Palais de Chaillot), but finally decided to just put it on the Champ de Mars, where the exhibition, and make the tower a sort of monumental gate.

Initially, Gustave Eiffel (engineer and specialist in steel structures) was scheduled to work twelve months, although in reality it took twice as long. The construction phase began on January 28, 1887 and ended in March 1889, before the official opening of the Universal Exhibition.

On the site of the work, the number of workers never exceeded 250. This was because much of the work is done upstream, in the factories of companies Eiffel located in Levallois-Perret. Of the 2,500,000 rivets in the tower there, only 1,050,846 were placed on the site of the work, 42% of the total. The vast majority of the elements are assembled in the workshops of Levallois-Perret, on the ground, in pieces of five meters, with temporary pins, and only then on the site of the work, which will definitely be replaced by rivets posts heat.

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The construction of parts and assembly are not the result of chance. 50 engineers for two years made drawings of the 5300 joint assembly or some details, and every one of 18,038 iron pieces held their own sketch.
At the site in the first instance, work on the huge concrete plinths that will sustain the four pillars of the building. This helps minimize the pressure on the ground of all the parts, which together make a pressure of 4.5 kg / cm ² at the foundations.

The assembly of the metal parts themselves, beginning on July 1, 1887. The men responsible for assembling this "giant Meccano are called flyers and are led by Jean Companion. Increases until the pieces are 30 meters in height with the help of cranes to lift fixed pivots. Between 30 and 45 meters high, 12 anadamiajes are built of wood. After the 45 meters high, had to build new anadamiajes, matching the 70-ton beams that were used for the first floor. Continued after the union of these huge beams at the four edges of the first floor. This union took place smoothly on December 7, 1887 and made unnecessary anadamiajes temporary, replaced first by the first platform (a 57 meters high), then from August 1888, the second platform (115 meters).

In September 1888, while the work is already well advanced and the second floor was built, the workers went on strike. Discussed by the working hours (9 hours and 12 hours in winter, summer), as well as their wages, which reduced viewed as taking into consideration the risks taken. Gustave Eiffel argued that the risk was no different when working at 200 or 50 meters of altitura, although the workers were better paid than the average wage for workers in this sector, given a pay rise but refuses to index on the factor the risk varies according to the height "(which was sued by the workers). Three months later, a new strike will burst, but this time the face and denied any negotiation.

In March 1889, the monument is completed on time and no fatality was recorded among workers (however, a worker died, but it was on Sunday and he was not working and lost his balance during a demonstration to his fiancée). The work cost 1.5 million francs more than expected and took twice as long to be built than what was initially envisaged in the contract signed in January 1887.

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Clancy's comment: information above courtesy of an English translation, hence some alterations in tenses. But, if you get the chance to check out the Eiffel Tower, do it. It is an awesome structure.

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9 November 2012 - The Golden Gate Bridge

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The Golden Gate Bridge

- San Francisco -

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Copyright Gavan Rowe (c)

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G'day guys,

Today I bring you another amazing structure - The Golden Gate Bridge.

The Golden Gate is the North American strait connecting San Francisco Bay to the Pacific Ocean, since 1937 it has been spanned by the Golden Gate Bridge. Technically, the 'gate' is defined by the headlands of the San Francisco Peninsula and the Marin Peninsula, while the 'strait' is the water flowing in between.

During the last Ice Age, when sea level was several hundred feet lower, the waters of the glacier-fed Sacramento River and the San Joaquin River scoured a deep channel through the bedrock on their way to the ocean. The strait is well known today for its depth and powerful tidal currents from the Pacific Ocean. Many small whirlpools and eddies can form in its waters.

Before the arrival of Europeans in the 18th century, the area around the strait and the bay was inhabited by the Ohlone to the south and Coast Miwok people to the north. Descendants of both tribes remain in the area.

The Golden Gate is often shrouded in fog. During the summer, the heat in the California Central Valley causes the air there to rise. This can create strong winds which pull cool moist air in from over the ocean through the break in the hills caused by the Golden Gate, commonly causing a stream of dense fog to enter the bay. The strait was surprisingly elusive for early European explorers, presumably due to this persistent summer fog. The strait is not recorded in the voyages of Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo nor Francis Drake, both of whom may have explored the nearby coast in the 16th century in search of the fabled Northwest Passage. The strait is also unrecorded in observation by Spanish galleons returning from the Philippines that laid up in nearby Drakes Bay. These galleons rarely passed east of the Farallon Islands (27 miles west of the Golden Gate), fearing the possibility of rocks between the Islands and the mainland.

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Copyright Gavan Rowe (c)

'San Francisco through the mist'

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The first recorded observation of the strait occurred nearly two hundred years later than the earliest European explorations of the coast; in 1769 Sgt. José Francisco Ortega, the leader of a scouting party sent north along the peninsula of present-day San Francisco, reported that he could proceed no further because of the strait. On 5 August 1775 Juan de Ayala and the crew of his ship the San Carlos became the first Europeans known to have passed through the strait, anchoring in a cove behind Angel Island which is now named in Ayala's honor. Until the 1840s the strait was called the "Boca del Puerto de San Francisco" (Mouth of the Port of San Francisco). On 1 July 1846, before the discovery of gold in California, the entrance acquired a new name. In his memoirs, John C. Frémont wrote, "To this Gate I gave the name of "Chrysopylae", or "Golden Gate"; for the same reasons that the harbor of Byzantium was called Chrysoceras, or Golden Horn."

The Golden Gate Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Golden Gate, the opening of the San Francisco Bay onto the Pacific Ocean. As part of both US Highway 101 and California Route 1, it connects the city of San Francisco on the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula to Marin County.

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Copyright Gavan Rowe (c)

October 2012

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The Golden Gate Bridge had the longest suspension bridge span in the world when it was completed in 1937 and has become an internationally recognized symbol of San Francisco and California. Since its completion, the span length has been surpassed by eight other bridges. It still has the second longest suspension bridge main span in the United States, after the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in New York City. In 2007, it was ranked fifth on the List of America's Favorite Architecture by the American Institute of Architects.

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29 October 2012 - Great Wall of China

Copyright Clancy Tucker (c)

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Quote of the day:

"Life is like a box of chocolates.

You never know what you’re gonna get."

Forrest Gump

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The Great Wall of China

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G'day guys,

Wow, what an amazing world. Today I feature one of many significant structures found around the world - the Great Wall of China.

Great Wall of China is an ancient Chinese fortification built and rebuilt between the V century AC and the sixteenth century to protect the northern border of the Chinese empire during the successive dynasties of imperial attacks xiongnu nomads of Mongolia and Manchuria.

Not counting its ramifications and secondary buildings, covered 6400 km from the border with South Korea at the edge of the Yalu River to the Gobi Desert along an arc that roughly delineates the southern edge of Inner Mongolia, but today only one is kept 30% of it. The average is 6 to 7 meters and 4 to 5 meters wide. Ming in his heyday, he was guarded by more than a million warriors.

The wall was named a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 1987. Much of the Great Wall is reputed to be the largest cemetery in the world. Approximately 10 million workers who died during construction. They were not buried in the wall itself but in its immediate vicinity.

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On 7/7/2007 the Wall of China was named as one of the winners on the list of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World.

In the eighth century a. C., at the beginning of the period known as spring and fall, China is still a feudal system, the territory is divided into hundreds of fiefdoms run by princes or states, in theory, all gathered under the Zhou Dynasty kings. But over time, they were annexed by the feudal princes great principalities formed in the sixth century a. C. some were Chu and Wu, China was rapidly fragmented into several independent kingdoms: the beginning of the Realm Fighters.

By then, several states are committed to building walls to protect their neighbors and foreign peoples. Thus, about V century a. C. The state of Qi began building a wall, some parts are still standing. In the mid-fourth century a. C. The state of Wei began building a wall on its western border, close to Qi, and a second wall on its eastern border. She was followed by the states of Yan and Zhao.

Commonly, the technique used for the walls was layers of soil a few centimeters are packed one on top of another. Wooden boards were removed, leaving a wall of earth. This method could quickly develop solid walls that can withstand centuries.

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In the year 221 a. C., Qin Shi Huang conquered all opposing states and unified China is establishing the Qin Dynasty. Intended to impose a central government and prevent the resurgence of feudal lords, he ordered the destruction of the walls that divided his empire along the former border. After the attacks of the Xiongnu tribes in the north, sent General Meng Tian to ensure that the defeat of the Xiongnu, and then launch the construction of a wall beyond the Yellow River to better protect new territories conquered by connecting the remaining fortifications along the new northern border. The transport of a large amount of materials needed for construction was difficult, so the builders used local resources such as stones in the construction of rammed earth and the mountains to the construction in the plains.

There are no historical records indicating the exact length and layout of the wall in the Qin dynasty, but in spite of the debate among historians and the absence of historical events, the Great Wall built by the Qin dynasty remains in the popular imagination as a Chinese colossal work with the nickname "Wall of ten thousand li" (5 760 km in the value of li Qin Dynasty).

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210 a. C., Emperor Qin Shi Huang Qin Dynasty died and who survived founded a few years. In the 202 a. C., Liu Bang, a former soldier of peasant origin who was a teacher in China and was proclaimed emperor under the name Han Gaozu. Weakened by their previous war of succession against General Xiang Yu, Gaozu leaves the maintenance of the Wall of Qin era, as the Xiongnu, now united in a confederation were threatening across the border, Gaozu, rather than adopting a offensive using the walls as well as Qin Shi Huang, is trying to achieve peace with honors and a "harmonious union" or heqin, ie the supply of Chinese princesses for the heads Xiongnu. For several decades, his successors will do the same. However, the Great Wall is not completely abandoned: under the rule of Emperor Han Wudi it recommends the establishment of borders tuntian (types of military-agricultural settlements) protected by small walls to colonize the region and prevent the Xiongnu raids.

In 134 a. C. the status quo between the Chinese and the Xiongnu was broken, unlike his ancestors, wudi have decided to take an offensive against the Xiongnu confederation and started in 129 a. C. a first offense, followed by many others. Wudi connected and restored portions of the Wall of the Qin Dynasty and then spread across what became the Silk Road. 119 a. C., the Xiongnu are expelled through the Gobi desert in Inner Mongolia, and a new section of wall, 400 km long was built and is kept current.

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In year 9 d. C., the Han dynasty is overshadowed by the short-lived Xin Dynasty, before being restored to 23 d. C. by Emperor Shi di Geng faced a civil war and when the Emperor Guang Wudi ascended the throne two years later, his army is too weak to effectively contain the Xiongnu. He ordered the construction of four new walls to halt their advance and protect the capital. Finally, about 48, the Xiongnu experienced infighting and divided into two groups: Xiongnu Northern Xiongnu and the South. Serve the southern Xiongnu buffer between their counterparts in northern China and was willing to coexist with them. At the end of the Han dynasty, China was divided into three kingdoms, separated by borders, making the construction and maintenance of large walls irrelevant.

While some parts north of Beijing and near tourist centers have been preserved and even reconstructed, in many places the wall is in poor condition. The parties have served as a source of stones to rebuild houses and roads. The sections of the Wall are also prone to graffiti and vandalism. Has been destroyed, because it is in the way of construction. No comprehensive survey of the wall has been carried out, so it is not possible to say how much of it survives, especially in remote areas.

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Over 60 kilometers of the wall in Gansu province may disappear in the next 20 years due to erosion from sandstorms. In places, the height of the wall has been reduced from over five meters to less than two meters. The lookout towers that characterize the most famous images of the wall have disappeared completely. Many western sections of wall were built from mud, rather than brick and stone, and are therefore more susceptible to erosion.

Clancy's comment: What can I say? Centuries later, humans are still building walls, moats and fences to keep people out. On that very subject, do you know what a zoo is? It's a great place for animals to observe humans. You get my point.

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