Reconstruction of Negrelli's Viaduct, Prague

If it were not for the Charles Bridge, the Negrelli’s Viaduct would be the oldest bridge in Prague. It has one primacy nonetheless – it is the first Prague railway bridge across the Vltava River.

In 1845–1849, up to 3,000 Czech, German and Italian workers participated in its construction. Alois Negrelli himself, who was assigned to build a railway from Vienna to Prague and to Děčín came from South Tyrol.

The 1,120 m long viaduct had no competitor in Europe for more than fifty years. It consists of 87 arches, 77 of which are of sandstone and 8 of granite (over the river). Open without any restrictions, it survived the floods in 1865, 1890 and 2002. That was because it had been designed based on fresh experience with a flood in 1845.

In 1873, “Karlín Connecting Viaduct” was completed. It is 351 m long and consists of 26 arches – 10 of stone and 16 of brick. It connects Bubny with Libeň without the necessity of going to the Masaryk Railway Station.  

That is the historical and cultural importance of this construction, on which a JV of the companies Hochtief, Strabag and Avers will carry out this project.

The bridge has been open for more than 160 years without any major reconstruction works. The reason for the current one is the fact that the bridge structure is in a critical condition, the superstructure is no longer meeting the standards and the signalling and security systems, power cables and overhead lines are obsolete.

The reconstruction will bring

• improvement of the technical condition of the bridge structures
• replacement of mechanical signalling devices by modern electronic devices (enhancement of safety)
• increasing the noise protection (anti-vibration mattresses, state of the art rail switches)
• new railway superstructure (improvement of the quality of travelling – undisturbed and smooth drive)
• preservation of a major transport engineering building that is even listed
• creation of cultural space for social events under the individual vaults (architectural benefit for Karlín)
• development of transit transport and public transport in Prague having a connection to the other transport engineering projects in the Region of Central Bohemia

This project is also part of the project under preparation – “Upgrade of Railway Line Prague–Kladno” including a branch line to the Václav Havel Airport.