The demand of new bridges and rehabilitation of the existing ones in Brazil is evident, in the municipal, state and federal scope. The construction of efficient roads can provide, besides comfort to the users, a cost decrease for the transportation of food and other products, since almost all the transportation in the country is made through highways. According to the estimate made by the Wood and Timber Structures Laboratory (LaMEM) of São Paulo University, more than 100,000 of short and medium span bridges are necessary to improve Brazilian roads. Therefore, the study of competitive technologies is of extreme importance, in order to minimize the budget needed to these improvements. This work reports on a technical and economical viability analysis of transversally pre-stressed timber bridges, for the use in rural and secondary roads. The analysis was made through design, construction and monitoring of the first pre-stress-laminated timber bridge in South America. The results show high performance, low cost, easy and quick execution.
bridges in decks; timber structures; transversal stressing
