Launch Complex 39 Crawlerway
The road that goes from the VAB to the shuttle launch pad is called the crawlerway. It is 3.1 miles long. The crawlerway is very wide and is made from Alabama River rock. Each side of the crawler way (it has two sides, one side for each side of the tracks of the crawler) is the width of a 4 to 5 lane interstate highway. It takes a full day for the crawler to get from the VAB to the launch pad.
To lift, hold and move what would be the largest, tallest and heaviest known portable structures on Earth, the crawler/transporter was designed. Adapted from self-propelled, strip-mining shovels, the massive machines weighed 5.5 million pounds unloaded.
This alone required a special roadway to support loads never envisioned for a public road -- in excess of 127,867 pounds (58,000 kilograms) per square meter. The design would comprise dual trackways, separated by a median strip, and would consist of just over three feet (1 meter) of selected sub-base material, topped by 3 feet (1 meter) of graded crushed aggregate, with a blacktop sealer over all.
A service road would border the south side of the crawlerway from the VAB to pad A. Underground ducts for communication and instrumentation lines to link the control and assembly areas with the launch pads would parallel the north side of the crawlerway; power line ducts and a pipeline for drinking water would go along the south side. Where any of the ducts or pipes had to pass beneath the crawlerway, the access tunnels had to be capable of withstanding the load conditions. The completed crawlerway would be level with the terrain, 7.5 feet (2.3 meters) above sea level.
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