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Building and repairing bridges and roads is very important for the infrastructure of any country. Many parts
of Indonesia, and especially eastern Indonesia, really depend on roads and bridges for transportation of
goods and services. Ferries are important too, right? Without a well built and well maintained network of
roads and bridges, Indonesia would be in trouble. The Indonesian and Australian governments are working together
to make sure this does not happen. Hence the Eastern Indonesia National Roads Improvement Project or EINRIP.
Australia is providing Indonesia with an interest free loan of $300 million. This money is being used to improve
the condition of the national road and bridge network in most provinces in Eastern Indonesia. Australia is
also providing about $28 million in grant assistance to help with the planning and design of these roads
and bridges. Some existing bridges are being repaired although in many situations new bridges will be built
to replace bridges in poor condition.
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At the moment, EINRIP is
designing a 98 metre long bridge that will be part of the Tohpati-Kusamba road in Bali. This bridge will be
a pre-stressed concrete girder bridge. The bridge will cost around 12 billion rupiah.
Another bridge which has just been designed is a 260 metre long bridge in North Sulawesi. This bridge crosses
a wide river that often has very high and rapid floodwaters. The new bridge will be higher and longer than
the old one. This bridge will cost around Rp 31 billion.
Even though these two bridges have different styles and designs, they all are constructed to support their
own weight (dead weight) and the weight of the traffic that must go across them. Bridge designers or civil
engineers must also consider other factors such as the weather, strong winds and earthquakes when designing
bridges.
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Before an engineer or bridge designer at EINRIP can begin working on the design of a new bridge, a substantial
amount of information is needed first —
The Eastern Indonesia National Road Improvement Project (EINRIP) will support 25 major road and bridge improvement
projects throughout Eastern Indonesia. The Directorate General of Highways (Bina Marga) has already called tenders
for 6 packages of road and bridge works, and one tender for the supply of fabricated steel bridge units.
A contract has been awarded for the Tohpati-Kusamba project in Bali, and construction is expected to get underway
during March. Contracts for other packages already tendered are expected to be finalized in March 2009. Tenders
for the other 19 packages will be called progressively during 2009, once all arrangements for land purchases
have been properly completed. Construction works will continue through 2011.
