Crosses Brisbane River Preceded by Goodwill Bridge Clearance below 13 m Total length 555 m Location Brisbane | Official name Captain Cook Bridge Followed by Story Bridge Opened 1972 Bridge type Box girder bridge Body of water Brisbane River | |
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Carries eight lanes of Pacific Motorway
Motor vehicles Locale Brisbane, Queensland, Australia Similar Brisbane River, Story Bridge, Victoria Bridge - Brisbane, Goodwill Bridge, Merivale Bridge | ||
The Captain Cook Bridge is a motorway bridge over the Brisbane River in Brisbane, in the state of Queensland, Australia. It was built exclusively for vehicular traffic and was opened in 1972. The bridge crosses at the South Brisbane Reach of the river, linking Gardens Point in the Brisbane central business district on the north side to Kangaroo Point and South Brisbane on the southside.
Location and features
Captain Cook Bridge is constructed as a multi–span, precast prestressed concrete free-cantilever bridge with drop-in mid-spans. Comprising a dual carriageway that creates two separate bridges, one for each direction of traffic, heading north-south over the Brisbane River. Each bridge carries four lanes of traffic in one direction and links the M3 Pacific Motorway to the M3 Riverside Expressway. It is the main route from the city's south into the Brisbane central business district.
At the time of completion, the main span of 183 metres (600 ft) held the world record for this type of structure for a period of three months, when it was superseded by the Harada Bridge in Japan with a span of 241 metres (791 ft).
The structure is Queensland's busiest traffic bridge with more than one million vehicles crossing it weekly in 2007.
Downstream from the Captain Cook Bridge is the Story Bridge, while the Goodwill Bridge is the next crossing upstream.
Concerns were raised in 2007 about the structure's integrity after it was revealed that contractors who attached a gantry to the bridge had drilled numerous holes which had damaged steel reinforcement bars. After investigations were completed it was concluded that the damage was insignificant as only 57 vertical steel bars out of 21,000 had been cut.