Projects

While Stronghold has been involved in providing prestressing services and supplies in over 10,000 bridges to date across Pakistan, and similarly a large number of rehabilitation projects have also been successfully completed by us, a brief overview of some of these projects is provided in the section below. 

This project is about construction of a 102-megawatt run-of-the-river hydropower plant. It is located on the Poonch River that is approximately 167 kilometers south-east from Islamabad and 28 kilometers upstream of the Mangla Dam Reservoir.

The project General Contractor, a joint venture between two Korean companies – Daelim Industrial Co., Ltd and Lotte Engineering Construction Co. Ltd., contracted Stronghold as a subcontractor for all prestressing related works on this project. Further, Stronghold was also contracted to provide complete design for the pre-tensioning yard that was set-up at the construction site to fabricate box girders for a bridge that spans over the weir walls.

In total 66 box girders were fabricated successfully with all pre-tensioning works carried out by Stronghold. Each cycle produced 6 girders with turn around time of about 3 days per cycle. All prestensioned girders after being launched to their respective positions on the wier walls were transversely post-tensioned by Stronghold. Special anchor blocks were also designed and fabricated by Stronghold for this application. 

The weir walls were post-tensioned with 20/0.6″ cables that were embedded with dead anchorages at one end while the live ends were anchored in a specially designed end block in the weir wall that itself was heavily post-tensioned in the vertical and the horizontal planes. In total, 756 cables were prepared and post-tensioned for the 7 weir walls. Though the PT design of the weir walls were based on the DSI System, the stressing and grouting works were carried out by Stronghold.

The Karachi Metrobus is the largest of the bus rapid transit project in the country with a total length of 112.9 km. The Metrobus comprises of five different bus lines namely the Green Line, Orange Line, Blue Line, Yellow Line and Red Line with Green Line being the biggest and the latest edition to the Metrobus system.

Stronghold provided all prestressing supplies excluding strands, and stressing and grouting services for the entire Metrobus Project. 

The elevated bridge sections across the project were constructed using box-girder as well as I-girder sections. Prestressing cables from 10/0.5² to 37/0.5² were used.

Given the large number of bridges with different span configuration in this project, both single end and double end prestressing has been carried out in the bridge girders. Stressing was carried out with 420 tons to 800 tons jacks with Type B2 pumps while grouting was completed using Stronghold MX-5 grouting machine.

As a major project constructed in Lahore, and the first one of its kind in Pakistan, the rapid bus transit project was planned in several stages. The first stage stretching over 27 km from Shahdara to Gajumata was constructed by M/S Saadullah Khan Brothers.  

For this major segment of the project Stronghold provided all post-tensioning material supplies excluding strands, and carried out stressing and grouting. Stronghold G-300 and G-400 jacks were used for carrying out stressing with Type B2 pumps. The girders had spans upto 30m and were stressed with 10/0.6″ cables.

The project was inaugurated in 2014. It was planned in 2011 by local authorities in conjunction with Turkish experts as it was modelled after projects like the Istanbul Metrobus System.

One of the major projects of its kind in Pakistan, Lyari Expressway is a 38 km long freeway constructed along Lyari River in Karachi. It by-passes the city’s busy corridor starting from Sohrab Goth and ending at Mauripur.

The expressway has multiple elevated segments with simple and continuous span post-tensioning from 25m to 80m.

I-girders and box girders utilizing cables from 8/0.5″ to 24/0.5″ were used in the construction of the elevated bridge segments.

All stressing and grouting services and prestressing supplies other than strands were provided by Stronghold. In addition, 66 pot bearings were also provided by Stronghold in this project.

The project involved construction of a 18.5 km long dedicated bus route with some segments totaling 12.5 km being constructed above grade. Cast-in-situ box girder section were used in the construction of the 12.5 km long above grade segment.

About 70% of post-tensioning related work and supplies other than strands for this project were delivered by Stronghold.

The bridge segments had 27-30m spans that were constructed with box girder sections. For post-tensioning 18/0.6″ and 21/0.6″ cables were employed. Single-end prestressing was carried out with 500 ton jacks. 

The project was funded by the Government of Punjab. It’s construction began in May 2015 and the project was completed with metro services being commenced in January 2017.  

Considered as the largest of its kind in the country, Zero Point Interchange is located in Islamabad at the intersection of Kashmir Highway and Faisal Avenue. It was constructed by Maqbool Associates (Pvt) Limited at a project cost of about PKR 4 Billion.

All prestressing services and supplies excluding strands for the interchange were provided by Stronghold in this project.

In addition Stronghold also provided stressing and grouting services for imported VSL ground anchors – 3/0.6″ to 7/0.6″. Ground anchoring was carried out for soil stabilization around an existing monument.

The KPT flyover bridge is located at a busy intersection connecting traffic travelling on M.T Khan Road, Jinnah Bridge and PIDC Bridge.

The bridge was built at a cost of about PKR. 73 million. It has 21 spans in total with spans in the range of 30-35m. The superstructure was constructed using cast-in-situ box girder sections with prestressing cable upto 24/0.5².  

PT design on this project was based on the CCL System. However, given the complexity of this project, Stronghold was contracted by relevant authorities in taking a lead role of handling PT related issues and getting all post-tensioning work executed under its supervision. In addition, Stronghold was also contracted in providing post-tensioning sheaths on this project.

In Pakistan, this was one of the first few bridges that were built as a multi-level structure. Further, the nature of road layout where multiple merging and exiting ramps are provided at the bridge was a unique element of this flyover interchange.

The longest bridge in AJ&K, the Rathoa Haryam Bridge is nearly 5 km long that is constructed across the reservoir channel of Mangla Dam. It connects the city of Mirpur with Islamgarh.

Stronghold provided all post-tensioning supplies except for strands and carried out all stressing and grouting on this project.

The bridge was constructed by a Chinese construction firm – Xinjiang Beixin Road & Bridge Construction Co., Ltd. It has 40-45m long spans that are prestressed using 10/0.5″ to 14/0.5″ cables with Stronghold G-400 jacks.

Transverse prestressing in the bridge deck slab and diaphragms was also carried out on this project by Stronghold with 4/0.5″ cables.