NEWS - Autostrada A1

N° 15, September 2010
AMBER One
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Phase 2 at midpoint
The advancement of the construction works on the A1 motorway, section
Nowe Marzy – Czerniewice has exceeded 50 percent. It is an important
moment in the prime road investment worth PLN 3,145 million. The new
carriageway of the Toruń ring road has recently been opened to the traffic, and at the turn of the years the drivers will also have the new arm of
the Vistula bridge at their disposal. The works on the Warlubie junction
built in the conditions of live traffic continuing on the existing A1 section
will be completed this autumn. If the weather does not thwart the plans,
the second phase of the concession-covered motorway section will be
handed over ahead of the schedule.
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NEWS
Important and symbolic
The bridge superstructure of the
MA-145 was completed in July.
Remaining to be done are: the
sidewalks, insulations, road barriers and balustrades, expansion
joints, and finally the wearing
course. The General Contractor
assures the bridge will be 100%
ready by the end of the year. In July
too, the southern deck of the
MA-91 bridge was finished. Obviously, just like in the case of
MA-145, with the superstructure in
place, the bridge is still far from full
completion. The schedule envisages having the concrete sidewalks
poured by the end of the year.
Final appurtenances
A
s at the end of August, the
works on the A1 reached the
advancement of 53 percent. This
means that half of all works
planned in the schedule have been
completed. The finished part of the
implementation process included
the construction works alongside
obtaining the building permits,
mobilisation of labour, equipment,
and production back-up facilities,
securing the materials, suppliers,
and subcontractors.
– The rate at which the works
on the construction site progress
is almost worthy the Olympics.
More importantly though, in spite
of the swift execution, the project
is conducted in an exemplary
manner in terms of both safety at
work, and the quality of workmanship. To see it with their own eyes,
the drivers who will take the newly built section of the motorway
need to wait but another dozenor-so months – assures Torbjörn
Nohrstedt, President of Gdańsk
Transport Company S.A.
cont. on p. 2
The finishing works are in full
swing on some fragments of the
motorway. The best place to watch
them is Section IV, where the traffic was moved to the western road
of the future motorway in midAugust. At the moment, the works
connected with constructing
acoustic screens are also very important. The front of the works
stretches all along Sections II, III,
and IV. The panel of a screen is
composed of a 125 mm thick aluminium cassette perforated on
one side and packed with rock
wool. A 2-T-bar HEB 160 forms
the basis of the screen support
structure. In Phase II of the project, the screens were founded on
bored piles of reinforced concrete,
whereas in Phase I vibration-driven steel piles were used. Piotr
Szeląg, Works Manager, has informed us that the motorway section that is currently under construction will have as much as 32
kilometres of screens put up. >
NEWS
Plastic for Arek
A1 workers are involved in the charity collection of plastic nuts for the
benefit of Arek Karbownik who suffers
from numerous congenital defects.
The 0,5 tons have been collected.
Relocation of Góra
Klęczkowska
Section I involves the characteristically immense scope of earthworks.
The amount of the soil moved here
exceeds 500 000 cubic metres in the
aggregate. Fortunately, the General
Contractor did not have to remove
the huge masses of soil from the site
or store them elsewhere. This is because the scoop from the cut running south of national road No. 55
could be built into the fill on the other
side of the national road. The embankment formed there reaches 12
metres at its peak. The embankments along the section are generally reinforced by stabilising clay with
lime to the standard depth of 40 centimetres. In effect, where the embankment rises 12 metres high, the
stabilisation procedure had to be repeated as many as 30 times for each
of the 40-centimetre thick layers.
The technology of stabilising clay
with lime made it unnecessary to
build in the geomesh to reinforce the
embankment. Apart from the above
mentioned works within the motorway’s right of way, an embankment
has been piled for the WA-102 segment production plant. Still outstanding major jobs include piling
another embankment at the WD-100
bridge. The future road has already
gained the anti-frost layer in the vicinity of Góra Klęczkowska. This is
the last layer the Earthworks Team is
responsible for. In their final phase,
the earthworks on Section I required
two machine groups composed of
two diggers and six dump trucks
plus rollers: rubber-tired, plain, and
sheep-foot. Those were assisted by
bulldozers and an equally important
water tank truck. >
PAGE 2  INVESTMENT INFORMATION
cont. from p. 1
The construction works are progressing according to the schedule. We have completed an immense scope of earthworks
connected with soil replacements,
cut-throughs, and embankments
(76 percent of the planned 10 000
thousand cubic metres of soil), we
have laid 406 thousand tonnes of
subbase and 386 thousand tonnes
of bitumen mixes (out of the re-
spective planned volumes of: 1 100
thousand tonnes and 1 200 thousand tonnes). Works are in progress on all 51 bridge and viaduct
structures, animal passes, agricultural passes, and two large bridges
over the Vistula river. The advancement on the latter is: 56 percent on
the bridge near Grudziądz and 82
percent on the bridge in the length
of the Toruń ring road.
– We are satisfied with the work
progress, the more so that the
frosty winter and the following
downpours and floods hindered the
construction works to a substantial
extent – says Piotr Janiszewski,
Project Director on the SkanskaNDI side. – Despite all this, a year
after launching the construction
works we have managed to reach
the midpoint. Ahead of us we, have
the last demanding season with a
huge scope of works scheduled,
primarily bitumen laying and finishing jobs – he adds.
◊
www.a1-autostrada.pl
Bridges over the Vistula
The venture of building the second stretch of the A1 motorway (Nowe Marzy – Czerniewice) requires the erection of two large bridges over the Vistula River. This is a unique situation in the
history of the Polish bridge-building – the Mosty trade magazine reports. No similar contract
will probably ever be undertaken. The two structures alone involve about 100 bridge-building
technicians and engineers engaged directly in their construction. The project gives them a brilliant opportunity to develop and attain professional satisfaction.
B
ridge one, given the working
reference symbol MA-91,
crosses the Vistula near Grudziądz.
It is almost two kilometres long
(1954 m in between the axes of the
outermost supports). The deck is
built under the incremental
launching method without erecting any supports (in the starting
sections) and employing the overhang concreting method (over the
waterway). Alongside its recordbeating length in Poland, the
bridge will be exceptional for several other reasons. The river-bed
MA-145
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span, 180 m long, will be the longest span of reinforced concrete in
the country. The record-setting
distance of 991 m will also be
achieved for the superstructure
mounted from a single incremental launching station. The construction works on the MA-91
commenced in 2009 and will continue for three building seasons.
The second bridge referred to
as MA-145 spans the Vistula near
Toruń. The works here continue
the project carried out in the
years 1992 – 1998, when one road
bridge was built, and all supports
for the other arm of the carriageway were erected. The bridge is
957 m long, and the construction
technologies here are the same
as the methods used on the
MA‑91. The construction of the
new arm of the MA-145 bridge
began in June 2009. The shell of
the superstructure was completed in July 2010. The new road is
scheduled for opening to the traffic in December 2010.
The completion dates scheduled for both new structures
visualise the progress attained
in the Polish bridge building.
The first arm of the MA-145 took
6 years to complete. Today, we
can build a bridge twice its
length in 2.5 years, and an identical superstructure is finished
in 1.5 years. The fact that the
original bridge near Toruń, put
in operation 12 years ago, turns
out more than 3.5 m too narrow
proves another fact: the progress, and the difficulties in
prognosticating the road traffic
volume. ◊
MA-91
INVESTMENT INFORMATION  PAGE 3
NEWS
The first SMA
The wearing course (SMA), or
the top bituminous layer, is ready
on Section IV. The SMA paving
began on 8 July. The durability of
a road is always the function of
the well-placed binder course,
the asphalt base, and the aggregate subbase underneath, lain on
properly compacted soil bed.
Nevertheless, the thin, only
3.5 cm thick wearing course determines the road’s adhesion,
the friction coefficient, and the
driving safety. The advancement
of the bitumen laying works over
the entire Phase 2 reached 21
percent in July. The completed
portion of the works involved the
laying of 291 813 tonnes of asphalt, including 202 854 tonnes of
the base course, 84 116 tonnes of
the binder course, 4067 tonnes of
SMA, and 776 tonnes of the wearing course (asphalt concrete).
The new arm of the Toruń
ring road in operation
In mid-August, the traffic on
the Toruń ring road was moved
to the newly-built western arm.
The operation marked the beginning of another stage in the traffic organisation on the Toruń ring
road, connected with the construction of the A1 motorway,
which will incorporate the ring
road in its course in the future.
Thanks to the traffic reorganisation, the General Contractor
could launch the repair of the
existing road so as to upgrade it
to the motorway standard. The
alterations will include its widening to 11.5 metres, reinforcing
the course structure, and erecting noise screens and anti-glare
covers. Widening will also be required on the bridge over the
Drwęca River. Here, additional
piles will be driven, and then the
supports and the deck widened
by 2.54 metres.
>
PAGE 4  INVESTMENT INFORMATION
Keep your distance
The motorway will soon be fitted with special information signs. They
will remind the drivers of the need to keep the proper distance and
state the recommended distances between the passenger cars and
trucks when driving at the maximum speed permissible on the road.
The initiative came from the Gdańsk Branch of GDDKiA, which has
already put up such boards along the Tri-City ring road.
T
he proper distance from the
car before us is one of the
key safety factors. The distance
stands for no more than the
safety limit, which enables us
to take up a manoeuvre, if the
vehicle in front of us suddenly
brakes.
The GDDKiA Gdańsk data reveal that the 2009 incident record includes entries on 140
crashes and 11 accidents,
which involved the battering of
the preceding car on the TriCity ring road. The number accounts for about 40 per cent of
all traffic incidents there. The
cost of repairing the damaged
protective installations reaches
PLN 800 thousand a year. The
expense is aggravated by the
traffic obstacles, which inevitably accompany the damage repair effort.
How large distance should we
keep then, and what determines
its length? To obtain the answer
it is useful to refer to the driving
technique based on the British
DSA standard. The so-called
rule of two seconds applies to
motorways and roads where the
permissible speed limit is at
least 100 km/h (marked as double carriageways).
The rule uses the time unit to
express the minimum distance
one should keep from the preceding
vehicle,
measured
against a reference point (e.g. a
road sign) that vehicle is currently at. The distance ensures
maintaining traffic safety at a
Bezpieczna odległość
130
80
-
75 m
-
45 m
proper level and gives time to
react, if the vehicle before us
starts braking down suddenly
and rapidly.
The DSA-based technique of
the driving rules emphasises that
the distance equivalent to the
two-second rule is the minimum
distance from the preceding vehicle and is true for optimal traffic and weather conditions and
good mastery of the key driving
skills. Two seconds represent the
absolute minimum.
Any shorter distance, even in
optimal conditions, will always
be dangerous, since we might
not have enough time or space
to react appropriately to an
emergency situation, e.g. the
rapid braking of the car in front
of us. Moreover, with the distance too short, the visibility of
the road ahead of the vehicle in
front of us and its surroundings
is reduced. This, in turn, decreases our possibility to observe the road and its neighbourhood.
If
the
traffic
conditions deteriorate because
of e.g. fog or rain/snow, the
distance from the preceding
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vehicle must automatically increase appropriate for the current situation.
At the driving speed of 30
km/h the car will cover the distance of about 6 metres between the moment we notice
the obstacle and the time we
start braking. The same distance at the speed of 45 km/h
will be 12 m. Increasing the
driving speed twice will cause a
nearly four times longer braking distance. Therefore, if our
driving skills are not too high,
our distance should be appropriately larger. A slippery road
will require the distance to be
up to ten times longer than a
dry paving. If the wearing
course is bumpy or scarred
with holes, it is again worth
keeping a larger distance from
the preceding vehicle to gain
time to avoid the holes.
In France, the minimum distances between vehicles and
vehicle groups are listed exactly
in a special decree published in
the official journal. The decree
further sets the penalties for
failing to comply with the rules,
a prison sentence included.
The French national statistics
for 2000 prove that as many as
23.2 percent of all fatalities
were victims of multiple collisions. The previous French regulations obliged trucks to keep
the distance of 50 m from the
preceding vehicle. Private drivers were obliged to keep “the
sufficient and safe distance”.
The new regulation reads that
the distance measured in metres should be equivalent to two
seconds of the vehicle’s motion.
The rule translates to: 28 m at
the speed of 50 km/h, 50 m at
the speed of 90 km/h, 62 m at
the speed of 100 km/h, and 73 m
at the speed of 130 km/h. Consequently, what we call “sticking to the bumper of another
car” costs the driver EUR 90
plus three penalty points. Relapse into the offence can cost
the French six months in custody plus deprivation of the driving licence for three years. ◊
Media on the A1
S
everal important meetings
took place on the construction
site during the summer. Especially noteworthy was the so-called
press-tour or a visit arranged for
the media. The journalists were
invited to a drive along almost the
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entire site, from MA-145 to the
southern abutment of MA-91. On
the way, the cavalcade of the
cross-country vehicles stopped at
e.g. the mining pits on Section III,
and at the WA-98 bridge. The interested journalists were also led
to see the laboratory in Lisewo.
The participants in the meeting
included representatives of the local media from the Kujawy-Pomerania and Pomeranian voivodships, and several journalists from
the national media.
◊
NEWS
President on the motorway
On Friday, 2 July, Bronisław
Komorowski(still a candidate in
the presidential elections at the
time), visited the A1 construction site. The President-elect
arrived at the Nowe Marzy junction, from where he was taken
to Polskie Stwolno along the
technical road. He met the labourers on the MA‑91 deck, and
viewed the launched section
of the bridge superstructure.
– Here, one can see the modern
Poland we aspire to build. Here
too, one can see the new prospects – said Bronisław Komorowski at the press conference organised at the tip of the
bridge in construction. Other
participants in the meeting included Cezary Grabarczyk, the
Minister of Infrastructure, and
the MPs from the region.
Vital weights
The permissible load for vehicles taking the A1 motorway is
11.5 tonnes per axle, which is
the highest limit on the Polish
roads. Alas, not all carriers
comply with the limit, thus pertaining to quicker wearing of
the paving. To quote the data
obtained regularly from the socalled HSWIM (the device enabling measuring the load of vehicles in motion), about 3-4
percent of the trucks driving
along the A1 are overloaded.
To counteract the practices, a
vehicle weighing station has
been arranged at the crossing
of the A1 motorway and national road No. 22 Elbląg – Gorzów
Wielkopolski in the vicinity of
the Swarożyn junction. In the
early May, the facility was handed over for operation. The employees of the Road Transport
Inspection took action instantly
and gave a “live” show of weighing trucks.
>
INVESTMENT INFORMATION  PAGE 5
NEWS
Visitors, not inspection
The State Labour Inspection has
extended yet another invitation to
the local employers and students
of the technical secondary school
of building to visit our construction
site. The visitors had an opportunity to watch the works on the
MA-91 in Polskie Stwolno and see
a show of the emergency height
rescue and personal safety equipment for works at heights and in
wells. The meeting gathered
about 30 employers and 20 students accompanied by their tutors. Noteworthy, the General
Contractor has joined in the ‘Safe
Construction Site’ competition
again. Last year, it won a distinction at the edition of the event.
Concrete casting over
”the national”
On the night of 12/13 August, one
of the most extensive concrete
casting actions took place on the
A1. The works lasted 16 hours and
engaged 40 labourers from several
bridge-building crews. The deck of
the WA-98 superstructure, right
arm, took 1135 cubic metres of
B-60 concrete. Two pumps continued to work non-stop, with the third
one on a stand-by. The shift of the
technological traffic to the newly
cast deck is planned as early as this
year. Once this happens, the siteheading traffic will cease colliding
with the national road Grudziądz –
Stolno. The traffic shift to the western arm of the ring road was accompanied with the introduction of
a several hundred metre long diversion at kilometre 145 of the motorway, the site of the future Nowa
Wieś Service Area (MOP). The diversion is necessary to build the tolling
plaza. The gates put up there will be
linked with a tunnel underneath to
serve the future employees of the
motorway operator. The diversion
will remain in place virtually to the
end of the project works.
>
PAGE 6  INVESTMENT INFORMATION
Full culture in the streets
of the Tri-City
In mid-August, the most popular sites in the Tri-City became the venue of happenings staged under the ABC of Safety picnic. The streets of Gdańsk, Gdynia, and Sopot turned into oases of motor traffic
safety and culture for several hours. All participants in the happening were also invited to the ‘ABC of Safety’ picnic to be held in Sopot
on 14 August.
I
t was already the third edition
of the ‘ABC of Safety’ event,
though this year it was combined
closely with the GTC’s Cultural
Driving action. The campaign put
particular emphasis on the
broadly understood motoring
culture, as it is an integral element of safety in road traffic.
The happenings at the most
popular locations of the Tri-City
were informative in nature and
aimed at encouraging the drivers
to keep the roads safe and cul-
tural. The passers-by were given
an opportunity to share their perception of culture in motoring
and take part in competitions on
familiarity with the traffic code.
The following day was the time
of entertainment in Sopot. The
programme of the event included
numerous attractions, to name
but shows of precision driving,
environment-friendly driving, car
repairs, and many prize-winning
competitions. DJ Bratos played
club music during the picnic, and
in the evening the star of the
night – Kasia Cerekwicka – gave
a concert. Every year, the ABC of
Safety picnic hosts many celebrities from the cultural and artistic
circles. This year’s event continued the tradition – the participants in the picnic could meet
their favourite actors, talk on
various topics, including the automobile industry and road safety. The picnic was led in a bravado
style by Kuba Bielak known to all
fans of motorisation.
◊
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NEWS
Lubicz is growing
No more collisions
The works on redeveloping all power, water, and gas lines colliding
with Phase II are over. It was not easy, says Wojtek Rosiński, Head of
the Dewatering Works and Collision Elimination Team, but the effort is
behind us. All that remains for the Team to do is to complete the acceptance procedure, which assumes six months’ trial operation.
J
ust as anticipated, redevelopment of the colliding high voltage (220 kV) power lines proved the
highest challenge. The problem did
not lie in the physical works themselves, as they typically took several
to dozen-or-so days, but in the formal preparations. The proper works
were preceded with lengthy negotiations, first with the grid owner
(PSE), then with the owners of the
plots to hold new truss posts supporting the HV cables, which collided with the motorway’s right of
way. The talks involved establishing
the extent of the transfer easement,
which is the basis for calculating the
sum due to the plot owner. What
makes the job of the Dewatering
Works and Collision Elimination
Team and of the Melioration Works
Team tougher is the fact that their
job is frequently done outside the
motorway’s right of way, on private
plots, and requires negotiation
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skills in contacts with the owners.
Another difficulty connected with
the redevelopment of the HV power
lines, Wojtek Rosiński believes, consists of agreeing the work performance dates. The General Contractor was obliged to file the relevant
documents with the grid operator,
i.e. Polskie Sieci Elektroenergetyczne, one year ahead of the planned
works. The information on the exact
dates the specific power lines would
be switched off reached the General
Contractor only six months before
the redevelopment of the collision.
This long waiting time stems from
the fact that the power supplier
must arrange for the power to be
delivered along an alternative line,
or the so-called ring, to enable continued and unbroken power supply.
For instance, at the time the Gdańsk
– Bydgoszcz line was switched off,
Bydgoszcz received power directed
via Szczecin.
Elimination of collisions with high
pressure gas lines carried another
challenge. At three locations the
General Contractor redeveloped a
400 mm pipeline branching off the
“Przyjaźń” gas line securing energy
to entire Pomerania. All works had
to be carried out at the high pressure retained so as to ensure continuity of gas deliveries. To that aim,
temporary by-pass lines of steel
pipes were mounted to take over
the gas supplies for the time of the
works on the gas line within the A1
right of way. The dates of the
switch-overs also needed arrangement six months in advance, and
that required appropriate harmonisation with the schedule of the
works on the A1.
All works were conducted in a
safe manner, in compliance with
the H&S requirements. Fortunately, continuity of the deliveries
was retained.
◊
A substantial progress is reported on the structures of the Lubicz
junction. The superstructure of the
WD-128 viaduct was cast in late
May. Its theoretical span in between the support axes reaches
45 metres. The structure is a permanent road bridge in the length of
commune road No. 100712: C
Przydatki – Grębocin, flying over
the A1 motorway at km 139+480. In
mid-June, concrete pouring on the
deck of WD-129 was completed.
Here, the theoretical span measured in between the support axes is
47.5 m. The bridge, just like
WD-128, has a double-span continuous superstructure of prefabricated beams of the T24 type, made
of pre-tensioned pre-stressed concrete, bound with the 24 cm deck of
reinforced concrete. Each of the
bridge spans is composed of fourteen 24 m long beams of the T24
type. The structure is a permanent
road bridge in the length of voivodship road No. 552 Łysomice-Lubicz,
spanning the motorway at km
140+907. In July, in turn, concrete
pouring on WD-130 was finished.
The structure took 2500 cubic metres of B-50 concrete and 270
tonnes of reinforcing steel. The deck
is of the continuous, four-span type
with the structure of pre-stressed
concrete. The theoreticalwidth of
the spans is 20+25+25+20 m. The
bridge is 35.65 m wide in total. Flying over the A1 motorway at km
141+638, it is a road bridge in the
length of the S10 road WarsawToruń, and the largest structure of
the Lubicz junction.
A1 in the limelight
The Gazeta Pomorska daily organises visits for its readers, to sites
that are normally inaccessible to the
public. The General Contractor
joined in the action and ensured access to the Lubicz Junction to those
keen on a photographic feast. ◊
INVESTMENT INFORMATION  PAGE 7
With the visit at the Operator’s
facilities
We continue the presentation of the Guide for the Visitors, which the Operator of the A1 Motorway, Intertoll, has prepared for the safety of the visitors. The visit at the motorway backup and
the motorway itself requires strictly determined rules to be obeyed.
P
lease be remained that the
first thing a visitor should do
is to report his presence to the
reception, where he should give
this full name, the purpose of the
visit and the person who he plans
to visit. The visitors cannot move
unsupervised on the OUA and
PPO areas. The motorway can
only be accessed in a company of
a person from service, who is responsible for equipping the visitor with a warning west. Smoking is prohibited on areas in
charge of the Operator, except
from places specifically suited
for that. Finally, one needs to
bear in mind to ensure permissible speed on OUA, which is
10 km/h. ◊
DIRECTIONS PLAN
MAINTENANCE AREAS NOWE MARZY
SITE PLAN
RESTRICTED ACCESS AREA
OUA
NOWE MARZY
TO
AŃ
GD
AY
RW
SALT
STORAGE
BUILDING
SK
A1
ADMINISTRATIVE
MO
WORKSHOP GARAGE
R
1
9
22
VISITORS PARKING
B
DŹ
ŁÓ
SMOKING AREA
INTERCOM reception
R
RECEPTION
B
GATE
OUA NOWE MARZY
DIRECTIONS PLAN
ADMINISTRATIVE
BUILDING
INTERCOM reception
26
2
A1
M
VISITORS PARKING
SMOKING AREA
PPO RUSOCIN
S6
WAY
OTOR
B
6
22
1 E75
SITE PLAN
RESTRICTED ACCESS AREA
S6 E28
TRICITY BYPASS
TOLL PLAZA RUSOCIN
B GATE
Gdańsk Transport Company SA
Registered & mailing address: ul. Powstańców Warszawy 19, 81-718 Sopot
tel. +48 58 521 50 00, fax: +48 58 521 77 77, e-mail: [email protected], www.a1-autostrada.pl
PPO
RUSOCIN
E28