Biomorphis Unveils Plans for a Green Timber Bridge to Inspire Bicycling and Biodiversity in Edinburgh

Edinburgh-based design and architecture firm <a href="http://www.biomorphis.com/">Biomorphis</a> recently <a href="http://www.biomorphis.com/Leith%20Walk.html">revealed plans</a> for a <a href="http://www.archdaily.com/247838/leith-walk-green-bridge-biomorphis/">green bridge</a> that will span the city’s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leith_Walk">Leith Walk</a>. One of the longest streets in Edinburgh, the thoroughfare long ago saw trams transport passengers commuting across the city. Over 50 years after the trams were ripped out and replaced by buses,&nbsp; traffic has worsened and budget cuts led to the cancellation of a new tram system. The city now must find creative ways to allow its residents to move across town. Biomorphis has suggested the <a href="http://inhabitat.com/tag/green-bridge/">green bridge</a> as one idea to improve mobility in Edinburgh by linking bicycle lanes that crisscross the city of 500,000.

Artisans would build the proposed green bridge's frame, which the firm has designed using a computerized algorithmic design, and the entire structure would then be assembled locally.

One of Edinburgh's broken links lies between two different bicycling paths that both end at Leith Walk. Currently cyclists who wish to cut across the busy artery have no convenient option to continue their ride in the immediate vicinity of this proposed bridge.

Taking a cue from New York’s High Line, the firm suggests building the Leith Walk Regeneration, a wooden bridge that would connect two elevated train tracks. And in a move to bring ecology back to this old city, Biomorphis suggests the use of locally and bio-sourced timber.

The end result would be the reuse of half a kilometer (0.3 miles) of unused train tracks and gardens that would line the bike path.

Like many cities in the United Kingdom, Edinburgh suffers from congestion and dependence on fossil fuels. Biomorphis views a potential solution for the city’s infrastructure woes within a network of broken links.

The wooden bridge link would add to a revitalized ecology that new open space and communal gardens would bring to the city. The end result, according to Biomorphis, is “to bring a lightweight structure with low embodied energy.”

The algorithm Biomorphis used to design the bridge responds to three guiding principles: suspension, repetition and alignment.