Work completed on two new HS2 viaducts near Oxfordshire

The high-speed railway will travel through north-east Oxfordshire.

Two huge viaducts that will eventually carry the railway across a floodplain.

A 2,695 tonnes deck for the Westbury viaduct near Brackley has been slid into position and construction of the abutments at either end of the nearby Turweston viaduct in Northamptonshire has been completed.

Both viaducts, which are three miles apart, cross the floodplain of the River Great Ouse which passes under the new high-speed railway twice as it goes through Buckinghamshire and West Northants.

Westbury Viaduct after completion of the deck slide (Image: HS2 Ltd) Built using similar designs, they use an unusual ‘double composite’ approach where a box-beam was created using layers of reinforced concrete above and below the steel beams.

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This approach uses less carbon-intensive concrete and steel than a more traditional design.

Westbury viaduct, which is 320 metres long, was assembled in three stages by pushing out each one from the north abutment before the next section was attached behind it.

The process took six months and was completed last week.

To cut the friction special pads covered in Teflon - a material usually found on the surface of a non-stick frying pan - were used between the deck and the temporary steel bearings on top of each of the concrete piers.

At the nearby Turweston viaduct two abutments were completed at either end of the 80 metre long structure.

Work will now begin on assembling the deck girders ready for launch of the 591-tonne structure early next year.

HS2 Ltd’s senior project manager Elizabeth Longinotti said: “It’s been incredible to watch the enormous deck at Westbury come together over the last year and see it so carefully slid into position.

"I’d like to thank everyone who helped make it happen – and I look forward to seeing similar progress at Turweston in the coming months.

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“The innovative double composite structure they share has huge potential to cut carbon in construction by enabling more efficient bridges and I hope that the lessons we have learnt can be successfully applied to other projects across the UK in the future.”

The last few months has also seen significant progress at HS2’s other major viaducts, including the structures that will form the Delta Junction in North Warwickshire and the viaducts taking the railway into Birmingham Curzon Street.

In total, HS2 is building more than 500 bridging structures – ranging from small road bridges to the record-breaking Colne Valley Viaduct in West London which became the longest railway bridge in the UK when the deck was finished earlier this year.