Almost seven months have passed since the opening of the Breil Bridge over the Danube to traffic, but even now the work is not finished, the cranes have not been dismantled, the final reception has not been done, restrictions are still in place and the road connection with the big one. The bridge is mutilated, without the main direction to Jijila – the usual road with one lane in each direction is not ready even now, although they have been working on it for three years.

On July 6, 2023, when President Ioannis, the Prime Minister, ministers, ambassadors and a distinguished procession of politicians and diplomats cut the ribbon on the bridge over the Danube in Braille, the official transport promise was that the remaining work would be completed. ready by the end of the year.

More precisely, a bridge over the railway that would actually connect the bridge to the Braila ring road on one side and the main road to Jijila towards Tulchi on the other side of the water. 19 km of road with one lane in each direction, work on which began in the spring of 2021, that is, almost three years ago.

At the same time, the developer had to work on the last touches of the bridge and on the dismantling of four huge cranes from the supports of the suspension bridge, for the implementation of which traffic restrictions were introduced – speed limits and a ban on driving at night.

Then, as the months passed, everything went wrong… Apart from the absurd episode with the untightened screws of the metal parapets, CNAIR began to acknowledge the poor mobilization of the builder, and the Minister of Grindean attacked the builder for the lack of activity on the site.

Months passed without much effect, the year 2023 came, and the works remained unfinished.

In fact, the passage through KF to the Brail ring road is almost ready, but the developer did not require acceptance of the works, so it was not opened for traffic.

In the drone video below, the road bridge over the CF, which should be opened to traffic as soon as possible, appears at minute 00:10 – 00:40, and the main road section from the bridge to Jijil from minute 04:02 to minute 08:37.

Grindyan: “What is happening there now is absolutely unacceptable”

• “What is happening there now is absolutely unacceptable. The works on the Brail side of the Danube bank have been completed, the entire crossing over the railway track, all the works have been completed. The company allegedly refuses to provide notices. At the moment, the traffic in Braille is turned upside down because they refuse to serve this message,” Sorin recently responded to Grindean.

• “You should know that I understand everything about the protection of interests, and everyone defends their interests, but this is something that causes discomfort among citizens – and my colleagues know that I asked them to quickly find a solution. Both the mayor of Braille and the president of the district council announced us. At the moment, the traffic, instead of helping all these investments of hundreds of millions of euros, because of this ultimately insignificant work, considering the other side, half of the traffic in the municipality of Braila has turned upside down. It is clear that at the moment it is clearly a deliberate action on the part of this company, but the blackmail does not work, at least as far as I am concerned,” Grindeanu said when asked about this investment goal, according to Agerpres.

CNAIR: The contract is behind due to the developer / What he says about the intrusions that have appeared in the anchor blocks

“The contract with the contractor WeBuild is behind schedule due to its insufficient mobilization,” said CNAIR, which said that work would only be accepted after all quality standards stipulated in the contract had been met.

In addition, after on-site inspections, the engineer and representatives of CNAIR discovered penetration of the anchor blocks from the settlements of Breil and Jijila. Thus, in order to control the infiltration and close the non-conformity reports, CNAIR carried out a “technical examination of the work carried out by the contractor at the construction site” and the first measure aimed at the following: monitoring the situation of the cities from the moment of the detection of infiltrations and after the commissioning of 6 months; a significant part of these infiltrations has been stopped and as a result of the views given by the technical expert after the bridge was put into operation, he extended the monitoring period until 31.03.2024, and after that date the final decision on the closure of the infiltration.

“After the process of inspecting the parapet safety screws on the Braille Suspension Bridge, it was found that out of a total of 100,000 screws, 401 were loose, which is approximately 0.4% of the total number of these elements. Two weeks after the opening of the bridge, the engineer noticed the appearance of mudslides on the roadway. On 07/25/2023, the contractor substantiated the occurrence of these degradations as a result of intense traffic and high temperatures.

Also, on August 2, 2023, TsNAIR asked for clarifications regarding the occurrence of silting and possible violation of traffic restrictions. At the same time, the ISCTR also requested the addition of controls in sectors where restrictions are imposed. So far, the contractor has intervened three times in the repair of the road structure on the bridge, but has not completely eliminated this problem. On September 8, 2023, the contractor informed the beneficiary about the measures taken to repair road 2, lane 1, namely milling and restoration of the wear layer,” the road company notes.

To complete all the works stipulated in the contract, the contractor still has to perform the following types of works: access roads (road to Jijila), works on the construction of rain receivers, marking and installation of vertical-horizontal signaling. elements for ensuring circulation and eliminating subsidence that occurred during asphalting.

Inaugurated but not complete – Traffic restrictions and long overdue work on the Braille Bridge

The Braila Bridge over the Danube, one of the most complex infrastructure projects ever completed in Romania, was inaugurated on July 6.

Traffic was opened, although the work is not yet fully completed, and the main road connecting the coast at Tulchi was supposed to be ready last year. At the same time, traffic was opened with a speed limit of 80 km/h and a program to restrict access at night to allow the developer to dismantle the huge cranes used on the construction site.

The total length of the suspension bridge over the Danube is 1,974.30 meters, and the central opening is 1,120 meters.

comparative, the famous Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco has a length of 1,970 meters and a central span of 1,280 meters.

The Braila Bridge mainly has three spans: the main span (1120 m) and two side spans of 489.65 m on the Braila bank and 364.65 m on the Tulcea bank. On one side and on the other side there are two approach viaducts, each 110 m long.

At the time of its completion, it was considered the third largest bridge in Europe in terms of central span. More precisely, it is the peak of suspension bridges in the current EU – the Braila Bridge is the third largest span after the Great Belt Bridge – Denmark (1,624 meters) and the Hoga Kusten – Sweden Bridge (1,210 meters).

The two towers of the bridge reach a height of 192 meters and are practically the tallest buildings in Romania (except for some chimneys or antennas).

The four main piers of the bridge are hollow inside and equipped with elevators and stairs for maintenance.

The total length of roads (including the bridge) is 23,413 km and consists of two sections: the main Braila – Jijila road with a length of 19,095 km and connecting road with DN22 Smârdan – Măcin with a length of 4328 km.

• The main road Braila – Jijila. It has a length of 19.095 km and will be provided with two lanes of traffic in each direction up to 8 kilometers, and then one lane of traffic in each direction until the end of the project – 19 km. The road also has curb lanes, driveways, a median square, and a parapet area.

• Connecting road with DN22 Smârdan – Măcin (which opens on July 6). This 4.328 km long road has one lane in each direction. The connecting road starts from km 7+940 of the main road (Brăila-Jijila) and intersects with DN22 Smârdan-Măcin.

VIDEO Bridge – Jijila link – current status:

Bridge across the Danube from Braila – contract dates:

Length: Bridge + road Brăila – Jijila (19 km), connecting road DN22 Smârdan Măcin (4.3 km)

Value design and implementation contract: 1.99 billion lei (without VAT)

Total investment cost: 3,445,210,691.08 lei (including non-refundable European funds in the amount of 1,696,947,365.85 lei)

Builder: We Build (formerly Astaldi – Italy) – IHI Infrastructure System (Japan)

Signed contract: 15.01.2018 (terms: 12 months of design and 36 months of execution)

Work started: December 2018 (permits for the construction of connecting roads were received only in March/May 2021)

Physical stage – the entire project: bridges – 99% / roads – 85%

Click on the plans to open them in a larger size in a separate window: