During our last class we visited Brooklyn Bridge which is a great example of suspension bridge. Once we got to bridge, we also had a nice view at Manhattan Bridge which is a suspension bridge as well. This was a great place to study how the suspension bridges are working since we could see entire Manhattan Bridge and while standing on the Brooklyn Bridge, see the bridge elements with more details. By looking at these two bridges the first thing that stands out are the cable towers, which are massive and we can clearly see that these are the bridge elements that act in compression and carry the loads to foundations. On the other hand I was able to clearly see that the cables carry high tensile forces and are holding the roadways of the bridges. While we visited the bridge it was very windy, and I did not see any of the cable shaking, therefore I inferred that there are high tensile forces transferred through these cables. Cables that carry the tensile forces and the cable towers that act in compression to transfer loads to foundations combined together make the structure of suspension bridge.
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