Berlin bridge construction: faster to new solutions for defective bridges!

Berlin bridge construction: faster to new solutions for defective bridges!

Berlin, Deutschland - The main committee of the Berlin House of Representatives decided on June 5, 2025 a groundbreaking submission of the Senate Department for Mobility, Transport, Climate Protection and the Environment (SenMVKU). The aim of this new decision is to accelerate the administrative processes for replacement new bridges in Berlin's national responsibility. These regulations are initially implemented for five years and are intended to represent a noticeable relief for future construction projects in the area of ​​the municipal bridges, as [berlin.de] (https://www.berlin.de/sen/uvk/Pressemaytungen/2025/Pressemage Department. 1567028.php)

The new regulation enables the complementary execution regulations on Section 24 of the State Household Regulations for replacement new construction measures for engineering civil engineering buildings. Furthermore, extensive test steps will be significantly reduced, so that in the future only an examination and recognition of the preliminary planning phase by the responsible testing authority is required. The examination itself is limited to the completeness of the preliminary planning, information on environmental compatibility as well as a cost estimate based on the preliminary planning and the associated economy.

optimization of the planning processes

The new procedures mean that all other concerns are already taken into account in the planning. This leads to a significant reduction in the testing time of planning documents from nine months to just one month. Interruption -free planning even allows further accelerations of three to six months. The use of modular and express construction can also save time. Thus, a total acceleration of the planning and estimation phase is promised by one to two years.

The need for new bridge in Germany is evident. According to [difu.de] (https://difu.de/projekte/Elats- newbau-kommunale-bruecken) there are around 100,000 street bridges in the country, which corresponds to a ratio of a bridge per 6.3 km road or per 800 inhabitants. It is estimated that there are about 60 to 80 percent of these bridges in municipal responsibility, which means around 70,000 municipal bridges. Many of these buildings come from the time of reconstruction and have been built between the 1940s and 1980s.

The age of these bridges not only leads to increasing repair costs, but also to an increasing need for renovations. Younger bridges, such as the early clamping concrete bridges, also show advanced aging processes that make their maintenance or renewal difficult. In particular, the increasing traffic volume, loads, speeds and the massive use of road salt have led to accelerated wear and tear.

nationwide statistics and challenges

According to the data of the BMV there are currently around 39,500 bridges in the network of federal streams, with a total number of 51.360 brücken-part structures. These bridges have a total area of ​​over 30 million square meters and a total length of more than 2,100 km. Many of these bridges are made of solid materials such as concrete and steel, whereby over 70 percent of the stocks are made of clamping concrete.

Given the challenges associated with the renewal of older bridges, the current study plans to determine the renewal and replacement requirement. The aim is to determine and clarify precise criteria for priorities in replacement new buildings when the economic replacement is preferable to maintenance.

Developments in Berlin are therefore an important step into the future of conservation and new construction planning, in a country that faces the challenge of modernizing its infrastructures sustainably and efficiently.