New Woodrow Wilson Bridge Operator Tower Features Cricursa Curvados S.A. Curved Glass

Forty five years after it first opened, the original Woodrow Wilson Bridge connecting Virginia and Maryland was demolished and a new, taller and wider version opened last month. The new drawbridge, which will keep the historical name, includes an operator's tower with curved glass supplied by Cricursa Curvados S.A., a manufacturer of curved and specialty glass products headquartered in Barcelona, Spain.

The tower consists of 35 multi-panel sections of bent layered glass fashioned to look like a ship smokestack. All the IG units have an outer panel with four layers of 6mm clear glass plus three layers of .06 PVB interlayer. Seventeen of the units were assembled in Barcelona and the other 18 at the main plant of Midwest Curtainwalls Inc. in Cleveland, Ohio. The units were then glazed into 13 separate curtainwall units with painted aluminum extrustions, special steel reinforcing gaskets and silicone sealants. TriSeal Super Spacers by Edgetech were also used.