Forth Replacement Crossing - Specimen Design and Construction Planning

The Forth Replacement Crossing will be built across the Forth Estuary in Scotland to maintain and enhance a vital transport link. In advance of award of the Design and Build Contract, design work has been carried out to produce the Specimen Design of the new cable stayed bridge with 3 towers and a pair of 650 m main spans. In the centre of each main span the stay cables overlap to stabilise the central tower, a unique design feature for a bridge of this scale. A fundamental part of the design was the consideration of how the bridge would be constructed.

This paper describes the Specimen Design and discusses options and findings of the work carried in advance of putting this major bridge project out to tender.