Suzhou-Nantong Yangtze Bridge
The Suzhou-Nantong Yangtze Bridge, the world's largest cable-stayed bridge, was formally opened to traffic on June 30, 2008 after five years of construction. The bridge, linking up the two prosperous cities of Nantong and Suzhou, runs 32.4 km, with 8,146 meters spanning the Yangtze, China's longest waterway. It has three lanes each way. Serving as a major land link between Jiangsu and Shanghai, the bridge was expected to ease navigation problems caused by ferries in the Yangtze estuary and to promote economic growth in the Yangtze River Delta.
The bridge, 108 km upstream from the Yangtze's mouth, joins the national highway network on the both banks. The journey between Shanghai and Nantong now only takes one hour, but previously it took almost four hours, including the ferry trip. With the bridge, it takes just seven minutes to drive across the Yangtze.
Built at a cost of 7.89 billion yuan (US$1.15 billion), it is the most complicated bridge project in Chinese history, setting several technical records.
It has the world’' longest span of 1,088 meters, usurping the previous record holder, the Tatara Bridge in Japan, which has a main span of 890 meters. The main navigational opening is 62 meters in height and 891 meters wide, which allows the passage of huge vessels with a cargo capacity up to 50,000 tonnes.
It also used the longest bridge cable of 577 meters, 100 meters longer than Tatara's record. Its steel and concrete towers, the tallest bridge towers in the world, stand at 300.4 meters.
