Kaķupīte Culvert
The Kaķupīte culvert has survived since the 19th century, when a transport and postal station road was built to connect Riga and Pskov. The original construction of the culvert was first mentioned in 1850. It is one of the oldest road structures under state management, as well as one of the largest culverts in the national road network.
The Kaķupīte culvert is 27 metres long and 7.5 metres wide. The historic culvert, 70 centimetres thick, was originally built of brick. During an inspection it was established that, compared with measurements taken in 1996, the old brick culvert had subsided by 17 centimetres and was in danger of collapsing. A decision was made to reconstruct the culvert, and the reconstruction works were completed in 2019. During the works, a new reinforced concrete structure was built, with a single inner lining of bricks taken from the original culvert vault. The installed bricks bore the stamp of the Veismaņi brickworks. In the course of construction, 7,500 m³ of soil was excavated.
According to Didzis Zvirbulis, project manager at State JSC Latvian State Roads, who oversaw the construction process, the greatest challenge during the works was maintaining traffic over a temporary bridge above a 12-metre-deep excavation. The most difficult task was restoring the culvert’s structure, including the inlet and outlet reinforcements, to their historic appearance. For example, the cornice above the culvert consists of stones weighing 1.5–2 tonnes each. The project author, Ģirts Šķupelis of SIA Projekts 3, based his work on standard 19th-century culvert designs. D. Zvirbulis acknowledges that he is overall very satisfied with the work performed and the results of the project. The reconstruction was carried out by SIA Rīgas Tilti at a contract price of €862,000 (including VAT), with construction lasting one year.
In the prestigious competition Latvia’s Best Building of the Year, the “Reconstruction of the Kaķupīte culvert on the A2 Riga–Sigulda–Estonian border (Veclaicene) road at km 85.60” was named a prize-winning engineering structure in 2019.
