The Cologne Rodenkirchen Bridge is a steel

suspension bridge A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck (bridge), deck is hung below suspension wire rope, cables on vertical suspenders. The first modern examples of this type of bridge were built in the early 1800s. Simple suspension bridg ...

over the

Rhine The Rhine ( ) is one of the List of rivers of Europe, major rivers in Europe. The river begins in the Swiss canton of Graubünden in the southeastern Swiss Alps. It forms part of the Swiss-Liechtenstein border, then part of the Austria–Swit ...

located in

Cologne Cologne ( ; ; ) is the largest city of the States of Germany, German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with nearly 1.1 million inhabitants in the city pr ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

.Taylor, R. R. (1974). ''The word in stone: The role of architecture in the national socialist ideology''. University of California Press
p. 203
Completed in 1954, it has a main span of 378 metres. It was named after the Cologne district of

Rodenkirchen Rodenkirchen () is a southern borough (''Stadtbezirk'') of Cologne (Köln) in Germany. It has about 110,000 inhabitants and covers an area of . The borough includes the quarters Bayenthal, Godorf, Hahnwald, Immendorf, Marienburg, Meschenich, R ...

Planning and construction

It was built from 1938 to 1941, after the design of

Paul Bonatz Paul Bonatz (6 December 1877 – 20 December 1956) was a German architect, member of the Stuttgart School and professor at the technical university in that city during part of World War II, and from 1954 until his death. He worked in many styl ...

and the planning of

Fritz Leonhardt Fritz Leonhardt (12 July 1909 – 30 December 1999) was a German structural engineer who made major contributions to 20th-century bridge engineering, especially in the development of cable-stayed bridges. His book ''Bridges: Aesthetics and Design' ...

, for the

Autobahn The (; German , ) is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official term is (abbreviated ''BAB''), which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word is 'Federal Auto(mobile) Track'. Much of t ...

Aachen Aachen is the List of cities in North Rhine-Westphalia by population, 13th-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, 27th-largest city of Germany, with around 261,000 inhabitants. Aachen is locat ...

. Today the

Bundesautobahn 4 is an autobahn in two discontinuous segments that crosses Germany in a west–east direction. The western segment has a length of , while the part in the east is long. Route The western A 4 starts north-west of Aachen, where the A ...

is the southern wing of the Cologne Beltway. On 14 January 1945 an airstrike destroyed the bridge. It was rebuilt from 1952 to 1954, with the old pylons re-used. The old bridge had 6100 tons of steel and the new bridge has only 3350. Because of the increasing traffic on the bridge, in 1990 it was expanded with an equal bridge, sharing the middle cable with the 1954 bridge. The expansion was finished in 1995.

References

External links

* * __NOTOC__ Suspension bridges in Germany Road bridges in Germany Bridges over the Rhine Bridges completed in 1941 Bridges completed in 1954 Buildings and structures in Cologne Rodenkirchen Bridges in North Rhine-Westphalia Demolished bridges Rebuilt buildings and structures in Germany Buildings and structures demolished in 1945 1954 establishments in West Germany 1945 disestablishments in Germany {{Germany-bridge-struct-stub

Planning and construction

See also

References

External links