The state-owned road development company Nye Veier may revise its plan for a new E6 European highway between Moelv and Roterud, including a wooden bridge.
The proposed four-lane wooden bridge across Lake Mjøsa would be the second such structure. The current wooden Mjøsa Bridge was opened in 1985 and is a part of the existing E6, the main north-south highway in Norway.
Nye Veier said it is in consultation with local authorities, including Gjøvik and Ringsaker municipalities, about its plan that includes shifting the proposed new bridge further south in the original plans.
Nye Veier is a road construction and maintenance business wholly owned by the Ministry of Transport and hived off from the ministry’s Public Roads Administration (Statens Vegvesen) in 2015. Its recent and future projects include the E39 Sørwest, E18 Sørøst, E6 Innlandet, E16 Kløfta-Kongsvinger, E6 Trøndelag and E6 Kvænangsfjellet.
The existing two-lane bridge, with pedestrian/cycling lane, across Lake Mjøsa is a concrete box girder structure with typical span widths of 69m. The bridge sits on piles, some to rock and some as friction piles. At the bridge site, the lake is app. 30-40m deep, giving a considerable free span in water for each pile.
In September 2020, Nye Veier and BERINOR, a joint venture between BESIX and Rizzani de Eccher, signed a design and development contract for the next phase of the E6 Moelv-Roterud infrastructure project. It includes the new, second Lake Mjøsa Bridge – possibly to be the world’s longest structural timber bridge at more than 1km.
BESIX and Rizzani de Eccher are working with the Norwegian contractor AF Gruppen, the designer and consultant Multiconsult and architect Knut Selberg.
Meanwhile, Innlandet County Council in Norway has announced that it will cost at least €29 million to clean up and build a new bridge after the Tretten Bridge in the Gudbrandsdalen valley collapsed in August. The Ministry of Transport has been asked by the county council to help with financing. However, the ministry says there is no budget for such investment on the county road network, according to local media.
