Santiago Calatrava Sundial Bridge

Santiago Calatrava Sundial Bridge

Sundial Bridge is a work of art that serves a purpose. Santiago Calatrava, a renowned
Spanish architect, designed the magnificent bridge (Johnson 65). The bridge is a cable-stayed
cantilever spar bridge for bicycles and pedestrians crossing the Sacramento River in Redding,
California, creating a giant sundial. The Sundial Bridge connects the north and south portions of
Turtle Bay Exploration Park, a complex that includes environmental, art, history museums, and
the McConnell Arboretum and Gardens (Heggade 9). Sundial Bridge also serves as a gateway to
the Sacramento River Route, a 35-mile (56-kilometer) trail that runs along both banks of the
river and connects the bridge to Shasta Dam.
The bridge was created by Santiago Calatrava, a prominent architect who has constructed
17 bridges for locations globally, including England, Argentina, Spain, Ireland, France, and
Belgium (Heggade 12). This bridge does not employ an asymmetrical arrangement of cable
forces on either side of its support tower to balance the forces; instead, it uses a cantilevered
tower placed at a 42-degree angle and loaded by cable stays on just one side. This design
necessitates that the spar withstands bending and torsional pressures and that the base withstands
overturning. While this results in a less technically efficient construction, the architectural
statement is impressive. According to Heggade (14), the bridge is 700 feet (210 meters) long and
crosses the river without contacting the water, which helps protect the salmon breeding grounds

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underneath the bridge. The cable supports are not centered on the walkway but rather split the
bridge into two paths, one major and one minor.
As the name implies, the Sundial Bridge is a functional sundial, and it is one of the
largest in the world. Because of the sundial shadow tracks, such a broad arc can only record four
hours every day, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. (Johnson 63). It is ineffective in the winter because the
shadow extends too deep into the conservatory to be noticed. When visible, the shadow travels at
a rate of around one foot per minute. According to Heggade (13), the bridge honors human
inventiveness and imagination, two key aspects of the 300-acre Turtle Bay Exploration Park. The
steel, glass, and granite span give the impression of weightlessness, and the translucent, non-skid
decking allows for superb nighttime viewing. The bridge is also ecologically conscious due to its
riverside location. Because there are no supports in the water, the towering pylon and cable-stay
allow the bridge to bypass the local salmon-spawning habitat while increasing public respect for
the river. Plazas for public use are located at both ends of the bridge; the north-side plaza reaches
the water, allowing people to sit right on the river's edge.
Sundial Bridge in Redding is a modern work of architecture and one of the best modern
bridges in California. Most of the structures designed by Santiago Calatrava share features with
the Sundial Bridge (Wenner 227). These art include Gare do Oriente, Reggio Emilia AV
Mediopadana, winglike brise-soleil of the Quadracci Pavilion, and Jutting out over Brazil’s
Guanabara Bay.
Can art be made by a crew of contractors guided by one person? Yes, undertaking
artwork as a crew of contractors increases the efficiency and reduces the duration taken by the
project. The use of a crew of contractors in artwork also gives room for better performance as
there is consultation among the crew members (Paulsen 641). An independent contractor works

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for himself, executes his job without supervision, direction, or control, and provides his services
to the general public. Acuña-Prada (1) stated that the law does not define an independent
contractor specifically. Thus, one must study the case at hand and consider all relevant aspects to
determine whether someone is truly an independent contractor, as there is a danger of muddled
practice and mistakes in work that is not closely supervised.

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Works Cited

Acuña-Prada, M. C., L. K. Coronel-Ruiz, and R. Prada-Nuñez. "Physics in architecture projects,
a perfect match on Alamillo’s bridge by Santiago Calatrava." Journal of Physics:
Conference Series. Vol. 2102. No. 1. IOP Publishing, 2021.
Heggade, V. N. "The Conceptual Design of Bridges: Form Finding and Aesthetics." Structural
Engineering International (2021): 1-16.
Johnson, Lauri Macmillan. "Beginning the Design Process.&quo


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