KiÄtŜaŇ's BlÖg: Official Opening of Helix Bridge, Bayfront Bridge & Youth Olympic Park

(Nice night lighting of the new "Helix Bridge")

(Event Balloon & banner showing the way to the new bridge & Youth Olympic Park)

Tonight, I went to witness the official opening of the Helix Bridge, Bayfront Bridge and the Youth Olympic Park at Marina Bay near the Floating Platform. The opening ceremony was held by guest National Development Minister, Mah Bow Tan and he also announced the name of the new landmark pedestrian and vehicular bridges at Marina Bay as “The Helix” and Bayfront Bridge.

(Photos taken at the Youth Olympic Park)

There was a 2 minutes firework to celebrate the opening of the bridges which eventually link Marina Centre to the new Marina IR which will be opening on 27 April 2010 for phase 1. The VIPs were given the priority to walk on the new helix bridge, while the public members were allowed to walk on the bridge only from 9.30pm onwards. The vehicular, Bayfront Bridge will be opened for vehicles from 25 April 2010 at 3pm onwards.

(Some performances at the extrance of Helix Bridge)

I was there to take some night scene photographs of the new Helix Bridge and to have a walk on the new bridge. However the Helix bridge was only opened till the midspan of the bridge as the Marina IR was not official opened to the public yet, so there was no point allowing the public to cross over to the other side of the bridge.

Brief information of the “The Helix” bridge

The idea of building this 280m long helical structure bridge was first announce in 2006 and it took around 2 years for the completion. This bridge is also the world’s first curved “Double Helix” pedestrian bridge to be constructed and it will form part of the 3.5km continuous waterfront promenade around Marina Bay and provide a direct link between Marina Centre and the Marina IR at the Bayfront area.

The total cost of the 3 added features is about $82.9 million and the project was led by award winning architect Prof Philip Cox, a consultant team, consisting COX Group Pte Ltd (Australia), Singapore based Architects 61 and Structural Engineer consultancy from RUP Pte Ltd (Australia).

The main structure of the bridge comprising of steel tubes which forms the minor and major helix that spiral in opposite direction and is held together by a series of connecting struts to form the tubular structure. The members were assembled with great precision with special stainless steel to withstand corrosion affected by frequent raining in Singapore.