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FCC lands 700 million euro Mersey bridge contract, its largest project in the UK

19/06/2013

FCC lands 700 million euro Mersey bridge contract, its largest project in the UK

  • The contracts includes the design, construction, finance, maintenance and operation of the new Mersey Gateway Bridge
  • The bridge is projected to carry over 80,000 vehicles per day
  • More than 4,600 direct and indirect jobs will be created in the construction, operation and maintenance of the bridge
FCC lands 700 million euro Mersey bridge contract, its largest project in the UK

FCC has been awarded the contract to design, build, finance, maintain and operate the Mersey Gateway Bridge in Liverpool (UK). Worth approximately 700 million euro, it is FCC's largest-ever contract in the British Isles.

The new structure will be 2.13 kilometres long and carry approximately 80,000 vehicles per day. Bridge construction is expected to commence late this year and to last three-and-a-half years; it is scheduled to be opened to traffic in the first half of 2017.

FCC, the Citizen Services Group, is a member of the two winning consortia (concession and construction). Its partners are Bilfinger, Sanef and Macquarie, in the concession consortium, and Samsung CT and Kier, in construction. Other finalists for the contract included multinational companies such as Balfour Beatty, Bouygues, Hochtief and Iridium.

The project
FCC will build the new Mersey Gateway Bridge, measuring over 2 kilometres in length, to the east of the Silver Jubilee Bridge, which was inaugurated in the 1960s and is experiencing severe traffic congestion.

The core of the contract is the construction of the bridge itself, which will measure 1 kilometre in length. The cable-stayed structure will be 42 metres wide and have a maximum height of 125 metres. The project also includes upgrading 7 kilometres of access roads, building 2.5 kilometres of new toll road, and upgrading 4.5 km of toll roads, as well other communication links.

A multi-lane free-flow tolling system will be installed which will read number plates automatically without requiring traffic to stop.

Improved infrastructure

The construction, operation and maintenance of the new bridge will create 4,600 jobs, both direct and indirect. The project will benefit not only the region of Liverpool (population of more than 1.6 million), but also northwest England.

Experience in bridge construction
FCC has extensive experience in building bridges. In the last 15 years, FCC has built over one million square metres of bridges of all types using all modern construction methods. It has built the Alamillo bridge (Seville), a bridge in Saxony (Germany), the Otopeni bridge (Bucharest), the Azud del Oro bridge (Valencia), the Basarab viaduct (Romania) and the San Marcos viaduct (Mexico), the second-tallest in the world.

Last week, FCC Construction inaugurated one of the most important connection hubs in the European Union: the bridge connecting Vidin (Bulgaria) and Calafat (Romania). The Prime Ministers of both countries attended the inauguration.

It is currently building major bridges such as the Centennial Bridge in Panama and the Gerald Desmond Bridge in Los Angeles (US).
 

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