In 1987 in Romaniain the city of Alba Iulia, An entire building was moved Of 7 600 tons about 55 meters with respect to the original position to allow the construction of a avenue. The operations were coordinated by theEngineer Eugen Iordăchescuand the “move” took place by doing flow the structure of the building on tracks specially mounted for the occasion, without even disconnecting users. The inhabitants of the building are remained in their homesand a woman said she had put a glass full of water on the balconyand not even a drop was paid.
History of the movement of the building in Alba Iulia
We are ad Alba Iuliacity of Romania, in the spring of 1987. The country is under the regime of Nicolae Ceauōscu – which will be dismissed after two years – and in the city they are in progress urban redevelopments that fall within the works of “Urban systematization” of the regime, followed by the 1977 earthquake. Among these, in Alba Iulia, the view of the view of a avenue is foreseen, Transylvania Boulevard.
Except that, where you want the panorama, there is a huge condominium in which 80 families livethat weighs 7 600 tonsAnd 17 meters high and 12 wide. Initially Ceauęscu wants to demolish it – as happened in the years previous to several other historic buildings – but the engineer Iordăchescu manages to convince the president to implement the “translation” systeminvented by him and already used on other occasions.
How the building was moved: the translation technique
The translation allowed literally to move the buildingwhich was before raised and detached from the platform connected to the foundations, then loaded on a sort of cart and slide on railuntil it relocates it to 55 meters awaywhere it was resting on new foundations. During the intervention, lasted about 6 hoursmany families have not left their homes, but they continued to carry out daily affairs. Not even users such as water, light and gas have been detached: Wires and pipes They followed the building in the new land.
Thanks to the translation, it was avoided to demolish, throughout the nation, As many as 13 places of worship and 17 buildings: for this reason Eugeniu Iordăchescu is remembered how The engineer of the sky or The Savior of the Churches.
Other translated buildings, one is in Italy
The case of the Palazzo di Alba Iulia and the translations for which we remember the engineer Iordăchescu is not isolated: in addition to the different movements that occurred in Romania, we know that in previous times such operations were already carried out. For example a BolognaIn the 1455, the architect Aristotle Fioravanti deals with studying and creating the movement of one of the numerous towers of Bologna, the Torre della Magionea fourteenth -century building today demolished, which was moved to 13 meters.
More recently, in 2019, in the USA, the Brown University of Rhode Island moved the Department of Historya 446 tons building, from one point to the other of the campus.
