Proceedings of the Belgian-Dutch IABSE Young Engineers Colloquium 2019 : YEC2019

During 2000 years, the basic material to build a bridge was stone. The typical bridge was the semi-circular arch bridge. The first bridges made of metal were again arch bridges where the internal forces are essentially compression forces. The industrial revolution and the progress of the theoretical knowledge in the field of structural mechanics made it possible to design bridges with different shapes. Bridges with large spans were mostly suspended and yet arch bridges.