Millennium Footbridge

As an innovative and complex structure the Millennium Bridge has been designed to achieve what may appear a simple form. The 4m wide aluminium deck is flanked by stainless steel balustrades and is supported by cables to each side. These cables dip below the deck at midspan enabling unimpeded views of London. The bridge is a very shallow suspension bridge where the highly tensioned cables sag 2.3m over the 144m of the central span, a span to dip ratio of 63:1. This is around 6 times shallower than a conventional suspension bridge. The four cables on each side of the deck are anchored at each abutment and propped by two river supports. The lightweight deck passes between these cables and is supported by transverse arms which clamp onto the cables on each side at 8m intervals.