THE AERODYNAMIC DESIGN OF THE MESSINA-STRAITS BRIDGE

The challenge towards larger spans, one of the most fascinating in the whole history of structural engineering, shall see several milestones laid before the end of this decade, with the construction of bridges breaking the one-mile limit and nearly touching the two kilometers. The knowledge underlying such advancements shows fully in the final design for a single span suspension bridge of 3300 m across the Messina Straits, which shall link Sicily to the mainland in Italy. Wind effects are dominant in the behaviour of such long and slender structures: after a discussion of related suspension bridge evolution aspects, the lines followed for the Messina Bridge case are presented, together with the bulk of experimental and numerical analyses that accompanied, guided and validated the design concepts.