Confederation Bridge PEI – Geotechnical and Marine Engineering Aspects

Join us to hear from James Ryan, M.Eng., P.Eng. discuss design and construction challenges encountered on the Confederation Bridge project. 

The Confederation Bridge is a 12.9 km long bridge connecting Prince Edward Island to New Brunswick, the longest marine bridge over ice-covered waters in the world. Mr. Ryan was a geotechnical inspector during construction of the bridge from 1994 to 1996. This presentation is a general overview of the means and methods used to construct the bridge, focussing on geotechnical aspects, including drilling, dredging, piling, foundation preparation of the sea floor, tremie concrete and massive marine crane placement of large-sized pre-cast bridge components in a marine environment. The presentation will include rare photographs of the construction progress and anecdotal stories and perspectives.

Mr. Ryan is from Prince Edward Island and graduated from the Technical University of Nova Scotia (now Dalhousie) in 1993. From 1994 to 1996, Mr. Ryan worked on the Confederation Bridge project as a geotechnical engineer and inspector. In 1997, he moved with his wife and young son to Edmonton, AB. From 1997 to 2015, he worked for EBA Engineering, later acquired by Tetra Tech, on a wide variety of geotechnical projects, focussing on infrastructure and urban development, in Edmonton, then Lethbridge and now Calgary. In 2015, James joined Thurber Engineering and has been focussing on a major LRT project including a tunnel and numerous bridges and on renewable energy projects, particularly wind power.