As part of plans to double passenger capacity at Reading station by 2030, a 40 m long, 17m wide bridge deck weighing 1000t has been installed.
The deck, which replaces four existing single-span bridges, widens the station’s western entrance and provides space for seven tracks to help serve five new platforms. Just 650 mm deep, it is one of the largest orthotropic steel bridge decks in the UK.
The entire deck was constructed on top of six precast concrete sill beams. CCL was commissioned to provide back-span tie down of the deck using its XM post-tensioning system. This was achieved by installing XM30 vertical unbonded tendons which were stressed to 65% UTS.
Before the tie-down could be undertaken, strengthening of the pile cap beneath the deck was required. This involved extending the existing pile caps and coring these to allow horizontal stressing. CCL XM bonded tendons were installed and stressed to 2930 kN.
