0 00:00:08,581 --> 00:00:10,269 - Hello, everyone, and welcome back. 1 00:00:10,269 --> 00:00:11,674 And guess where we are? 2 00:00:11,674 --> 00:00:13,769 Do you recognize the bridge? 3 00:00:13,769 --> 00:00:15,218 If you do recognize the bridge, 4 00:00:15,218 --> 00:00:17,271 do you know who designed the bridge? 5 00:00:17,271 --> 00:00:19,799 This is the George Washington Bridge, and as you might have 6 00:00:19,799 --> 00:00:22,780 guessed by today's lecture, the title, Ammann is the one 7 00:00:22,780 --> 00:00:25,003 who designed this bridge. 8 00:00:25,003 --> 00:00:26,702 He actually designed many bridges around 9 00:00:26,702 --> 00:00:28,663 the New York City area, and many people say 10 00:00:28,663 --> 00:00:31,176 that he stitched New York City together. 11 00:00:31,176 --> 00:00:32,713 For example, he not only designed 12 00:00:32,713 --> 00:00:35,047 the George Washington Bridge, but the Bayonne Bridge, 13 00:00:35,047 --> 00:00:37,812 the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge, 14 00:00:37,812 --> 00:00:40,595 the Throgs Neck Bridge, and several others 15 00:00:40,595 --> 00:00:42,335 in the New York City area. 16 00:00:42,335 --> 00:00:44,383 So you recognize his bridges, especially if you live 17 00:00:44,383 --> 00:00:47,116 in New York City or have lived in New York City, 18 00:00:47,116 --> 00:00:49,781 but many people don't know the man, Othmar Ammann, 19 00:00:49,781 --> 00:00:52,776 nor the story behind the designs of his bridges. 20 00:00:52,776 --> 00:00:55,586 So in today's lecture, we're going to focus specifically 21 00:00:55,586 --> 00:00:58,303 on three bridges and touch upon a fourth. 22 00:00:58,303 --> 00:01:01,350 So we're gonna look at in detail the Bayonne Bridge, 23 00:01:01,350 --> 00:01:03,338 and the George Washington Bridge, 24 00:01:03,338 --> 00:01:05,073 and the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, 25 00:01:05,073 --> 00:01:07,715 and we're gonna touch upon the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge, 26 00:01:07,715 --> 00:01:10,426 all bridges designed by Othmar Ammann. 27 00:01:10,426 --> 00:01:13,841 For today's lecture, one goal is gonna be to look at 28 00:01:13,841 --> 00:01:16,704 Othmar Ammann and who were the greatest people 29 00:01:16,704 --> 00:01:18,251 that influenced him in his life, 30 00:01:18,251 --> 00:01:20,647 who were his greatest mentors. 31 00:01:20,647 --> 00:01:22,597 So we're gonna look at two people in particular 32 00:01:22,597 --> 00:01:24,301 who influenced Ammann. 33 00:01:24,301 --> 00:01:27,279 Next, we're gonna do a comparative critical analysis 34 00:01:27,279 --> 00:01:30,752 using the Bayonne Bridge and compare it to an earlier 35 00:01:30,752 --> 00:01:34,215 design by Ammann and one of his colleagues. 36 00:01:34,215 --> 00:01:36,987 Next, we're gonna look at the George Washington Bridge, 37 00:01:36,987 --> 00:01:38,804 we're gonna look at the scientific, social, 38 00:01:38,804 --> 00:01:41,234 and symbolic aspects of this bridge, 39 00:01:41,234 --> 00:01:44,074 and following the George Washington Bridge 40 00:01:44,074 --> 00:01:46,199 there was a new trend in bridge design 41 00:01:46,199 --> 00:01:48,635 and this trend was about thin decks 42 00:01:48,635 --> 00:01:51,112 and we're gonna look to see what effect 43 00:01:51,112 --> 00:01:54,754 this trend of thin decks had in particular on the dynamic 44 00:01:54,754 --> 00:01:57,845 effects of wind, these dynamic effects that the wind had 45 00:01:57,845 --> 00:02:00,301 on long, thin suspension bridges. 46 00:02:00,301 --> 00:02:02,345 And finally, we're gonna end the lecture looking at 47 00:02:02,345 --> 00:02:05,019 the scientific, social, and symbolic aspects 48 00:02:05,019 --> 00:02:07,924 of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. 49 00:02:07,924 --> 00:02:10,542 So I will mention two people who are great people 50 00:02:10,542 --> 00:02:13,541 who influenced Ammann and were great mentors to him. 51 00:02:13,541 --> 00:02:15,693 One was a teacher, Wilhelm Ritter, 52 00:02:15,693 --> 00:02:17,893 who taught at the ETH in Zurich, 53 00:02:17,893 --> 00:02:21,610 where Othmar Ammann went to the university. 54 00:02:21,610 --> 00:02:24,546 And Ritter was a special teacher because he taught not only 55 00:02:24,546 --> 00:02:27,918 the hard-core technical aspects of engineering, 56 00:02:27,918 --> 00:02:30,675 but he also taught about the aesthetics. 57 00:02:30,675 --> 00:02:34,373 So inside of this teaching of the technical 58 00:02:34,373 --> 00:02:37,746 were comments related to the aesthetics 59 00:02:37,746 --> 00:02:41,130 that forced, or at least started to have the students 60 00:02:41,130 --> 00:02:45,228 consider about aesthetic considerations of their designs. 61 00:02:45,228 --> 00:02:48,296 Ritter came to the US before he was teaching 62 00:02:48,296 --> 00:02:50,994 to study the bridges of the US, 63 00:02:50,994 --> 00:02:52,868 and he wrote a book about that. 64 00:02:52,868 --> 00:02:55,487 So in this book, for example, was a bridge called 65 00:02:55,487 --> 00:02:57,703 the Washington Bridge, this is not 66 00:02:57,703 --> 00:02:59,328 the George Washington Bridge, this is 67 00:02:59,328 --> 00:03:01,862 the Washington Bridge over the Harlem River, 68 00:03:01,862 --> 00:03:04,014 not too far from where we are right now. 69 00:03:04,014 --> 00:03:06,692 So there's a sketch of that in the book, 70 00:03:06,692 --> 00:03:08,722 and also sketches about details, 71 00:03:08,722 --> 00:03:11,813 so he taught about the importance of details. 72 00:03:11,813 --> 00:03:14,877 Most of the major bridge failures are failures 73 00:03:14,877 --> 00:03:16,959 of the connection details, so the details 74 00:03:16,959 --> 00:03:20,657 are super important in any design that anyone makes. 75 00:03:20,657 --> 00:03:23,416 But he also, as I mentioned, taught about the aesthetics. 76 00:03:23,416 --> 00:03:25,896 So he wrote about a bridge that, quote, 77 00:03:25,896 --> 00:03:29,278 "Has no aesthetic sense," so he was teaching about 78 00:03:29,278 --> 00:03:31,889 the aesthetics and the consideration of aesthetics 79 00:03:31,889 --> 00:03:34,895 in his designs, or in designs of bridges, 80 00:03:34,895 --> 00:03:37,996 and these are ideas that Othmar Ammann was learning 81 00:03:37,996 --> 00:03:40,690 while in the classroom with Wilhelm Ritter, 82 00:03:40,690 --> 00:03:43,641 and we're gonna talk about Wilhelm Ritter again later on 83 00:03:43,641 --> 00:03:45,338 when we talk about Robert Maillart, 84 00:03:45,338 --> 00:03:48,059 a great designer of concrete bridges. 85 00:03:48,059 --> 00:03:50,956 The last page in the book, of Ritter's book on the bridges 86 00:03:50,956 --> 00:03:54,861 of the US, was a proposal to cross the Hudson River. 87 00:03:54,861 --> 00:03:57,118 The Hudson River is right behind me, 88 00:03:57,118 --> 00:03:59,055 it's on the west side of Manhattan 89 00:03:59,055 --> 00:04:02,958 and it's the river in between Manhattan and New Jersey. 90 00:04:02,958 --> 00:04:06,374 So this is a proposal that was put forward by a man named 91 00:04:06,374 --> 00:04:09,471 Gustav Lindenthal, and in the proposal, 92 00:04:09,471 --> 00:04:12,296 the span was on the order of, say, 3,000 feet 93 00:04:12,296 --> 00:04:16,394 and that's a tremendous span for any bridge at that time. 94 00:04:16,394 --> 00:04:18,943 But this was in the book, and these ideas 95 00:04:18,943 --> 00:04:22,002 were inspiring Ammann.