Name: Bridging the Expanse
Uploaded: 2019
Description: Bridging The Expanse celebrates the world’s most iconic bridges, exploring feats of engineering.

Bridging The Expanse celebrates the world’s most iconic bridges, exploring feats of engineering.

From the first log thrust over a divide, bridges have united us, facilitating our need to explore and our desire to extend our mastery of physics. In this episode, we look at bridges built by pre-industrial societies around the globe.

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From the first log thrust over a divide, bridges have united us, facilitating our need to explore and our desire to extend our mastery of physics

The Wonder of Bridges

New materials spark evolution for bridge design throughout the Industrial Revolution; as societies shifted away from agrarian lifestyles, towards industrial economies. It's all about iron and steel and the building of railways.

New materials spark evolution for bridge design throughout the Industrial Revolution; as societies shifted away from agrarian lifestyles, towards industrial economies.

The Elegance of Iron

The bridge-building boom continues worldwide, with young engineers striving to innovate with bold, structures made with shiny new metal. Undeterred by the Great Depression large infrastructure projects keep economies going

The bridge-building boom continues worldwide, with young engineers striving to innovate with bold, structures made with shiny new metal.

Baring all in Steel

Amidst WW2, battles were fought and won for bridges. Key to strategic maneuvering across the land, historic structures often targeted to acquire or destroy during wartime.

The Making and Breaking of Icons

It is difficult enough to design a bridge that will remain aesthetically relevant for a hundred and twenty-odd years. Let alone one that maintains its resilience. Advanced understanding of environmental factors and impact prevention sees many historic structures retrofit or updated to stay relevant.

Designing bridges with a lifespan worthy of their considerable cost is often easier said than done.

Resilience is King

An era defined by greater collaboration between artists, architects, and engineers. Their combined expertise pushes design principles to question the fundamental purpose or mechanics of new structures.

Using advanced computer software, many projects are pushing the boundaries of bridge design and engineering the impossible.