Strengthening the 100-year-old reinforced concrete dome of the Centennial Hall in Wroclaw

The Centennial Hall, a reinforced concrete structure with an auditorium for 10000 people, was opened in Wrocław, Poland (then Breslau, Germany), in 1913 after two years of construction. Its dome, covering the whole building, has a diameter of 65.0 m and in the year it was completed was the largest reinforced concrete dome in the world. This broke the previous record, held by the dome of the Pantheon in Rome (43.3 m), which had lasted for 1787 years. This paper describes the structure of the building, its condition after 100 years of use and the renovation works carried out in 2009-2011. An important part of the renovation was strengthening the lower (tension) ring of the ribbed dome by way of external prestressing. Details concerning the assessment of the technical condition of the hall, numerical calculations and the proposed system of strengthening are presented. In 2006 the monumental Centennial Hall was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site for its pioneering reinforced concrete structure, designed in the style of modernism.