Go Between Bridge

It’s not unknown for urban designers to use the phrase “lipstick on a pig” to describe average projects tarted up with landscaping, bright colours, and unnecessary bolt-on accessories. This would be true of many recent infrastructure projects in Brisbane.

Go Between Bridge should not, however, get this badge. This steeply curving bridge is a sleek structure, its form bearing some resemblance to the Victoria Bridge, downstream in the city centre. From a distance Go Between is a neat addition to the expanding tapestry of bridges inhabiting the stretch of river between Milton and Gardens Point. So why then did its designers or builders feel the need to embellish Go Between with blue stick-on panels?

And which courageous committee specified that the bridge be lined with concrete crash barriers? Safe yes, but obviously opaque. This is a toll without a view. Surely not the only fencing solution? Notable also are the bulky, overhanging toll gantries marking arrival at the bridge from the south, and the pair of switchback pedestrian ramps. No doubt these ramps comply with disabled access grades, but this results in a level difference between road and path at each end, physically and symbolically separating transport modes and presenting northbound walkers with an ugly view directly into the insides of the Coronation Drive Viaduct. We think this “Go By The Regulations Bridge” shows ugly detailing, like hastily chosen tattoos on an otherwise fine body.

The use of tolls and the price Brisbanites are prepared to pay to cross the river is a whole other question, and not one of urban design. But what is interesting is to compare the three new bridges (Kurilpa, Gateway and Go Between), and one tunnel, crossing the Brisbane River and opened within the past 12 months. For crossing the same river is where the similarities end. The functions and forms of this new infrastructure, as well as the scale and even methods of procurement could not be more different.

These crossings are all long-term investments in cross-river connectivity. Different locations, equal importance. But in a way they are also in competition, firstly for traffic and tolls, but also for a place on the city’s mental map. And in an increasingly crowded list of engineering icons, they are in competition for a place in history. Perhaps Go Between’s mistake is to try too hard.