Heerenveen, April 4, 2017 – It is expected that Antea Group, in association with Chilean partner LEN & Asociados, will be designing the new double leaf bascule bridge over the Cau-Cau River in Valdivia, Chile. Construction of the existing bridge began back in 2011, but the bridge was never commissioned due to technical errors. The Ministry for Public Works consequently went out to tender, with the aim of resolving the bridge's problems once and for all with a new party.

The bridge would have been Chile’s first movable bridge, but there were technical errors in its design and construction. In 2013 it became apparent that the two bridge elements did not align properly and in 2015, during testing, one of the cylinders failed. 

Great Opportunity

At the end of 2016 the client, La Dirección de Vialidad del Ministerio de Obras Públicas, went out to tender with several local engineering consultancies, on the condition that they must bid in association with a specialist foreign engineering firm. “Antea Group is already a leader in the Netherlands and this contract gives us a great opportunity to demonstrate our expertise in the field of safe and reliable movable bridges, outside of the Netherlands,” says Peter Vos, Movable Bridges Project Manager. The contract involves setting up a consortium with the Chilean engineering firm LEN & Asociados. LEN is one of Chile’s top engineering firms, with more than 40 years of experience in consultancy and engineering services in the field of infrastructure. 

Cau-Cau Bridge

The new bridge, measuring 363 meters in length and 14 meters in width, will link the island of Las Tejas with the Las Animas zone, thus improving Valdivia's accessibility. The bridge must be accessible to pedestrian, bicycle and vehicular traffic. The bridge will be redesigned from scratch, including an assessment of which, if any, of the existing bridge elements can be reused. Tendering and construction will also be supervised by the consortium. The work will take at least three years to complete. 

Of the three bidding parties, the AG-LEN bridgXperts consortium submitted the best financial bid. The final contract will be awarded shortly.