An infrastructure project took place in August 2025 in the heart of Hamburg, Germany. Within just a few days nine steel railway bridge superstructures were installed for long-distance and regional lines. Each bridge weighed around 120 tonnes. In the very limited space of the city centre Cometto SPMT units, combined with hydraulic jack-up systems, positioned the heavy trough bridges to the millimetre.
The installation took place under particularly challenging conditions: two parallel-coupled SPMT units – a six-axle and a four-axle with Power Pack Unit – were each combined with 2×2 type Enerpac JS 250 jack-up systems. The bridges had to be installed at angles of up to 43 degrees, taking into account a slope of eight percent in the driving direction and three percent sideways.
“What was especially challenging is that we have to place the bridges on the SPMTs at a 45- or 25-degree angle, with only very narrow tolerances within the travel paths inside the bridge channel,” explained Rocco Schimmel, head of crane service, heavy installation & project engineering at German crane and engineering group Eisele – one of the companies involved.
Support was provided by a three-point bearing system, while a third SPMT unit transported the bridges from interim storage on nearby roundabouts. The team was assisted by a total of seven mobile cranes.
“The bridges have to be levelled to the centimetre – but we can lift them to the millimetre, which is fantastic!” says Schimmel. “We have already used Cometto axles several times, and everything always works flawlessly.” Originally, the companies scheduled five days for the installation. Efficient teamwork between all participants and reliable technology meant the project was successfully completed in just three days.
A video about the project can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdieuTgltgA
