La Passerelle du Marché – Maisons-Laffitte

The market footbridge is one of the four crossings of the railway network that passes through the town of Maisons-Laffitte in the north-west of Paris, France. It is a crucial inter-city link because it is the only crossing dedicated to pedestrians and cycles.

The footbridge is completely made of steel and consists of two staircases and a main span, which create a fluid and elegant outline by means of a “Z” in-plane shape. The lifts, prismatic objects with dark tinted glass panels, are designed as counterpoints in the composition, contrasting with the main structure.

The staircases and the deck form a continuous assembly realized in smooth “U” shape steel box shells. These very slender shells are supported on both sides of the railway tracks by pinned hollow round columns over a free span of 42m.

Special attention has been paid to the pedestrian comfort. Taking into account dynamic effects from the very first stages of design, and throughout the production process, ensured a good anticipation of the dynamic comfort issue. The architectural intention, which was to promote a slender construction with a reduced structural height, has logically led to a solution with tuned mass dampers (TMD). Calculations of the structure and damper devices with precise 3D finite element models, as well as an accurate design of the different details have made their subtle integration possible without any impact on the overall architecture.

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