China has set a new record after construction finished on the world's longest over-water bridge.
Slicing through the Jiaozhou Bay, and connecting the port city of Qingdao with the suburb of Huangdao, the Qingdao Haiwan Bridge is a monstrous, 26-mile-long road traffic bridge. It took four years to build, at a cost of £5.5 billion, and the 450,000-tonne steel structure took more than 10,000 workers to construct.
It's sturdy too, with Chinese officials stating that the structure can withstand typhoons, the impact of a 300,000 tonne vessel or a magnitude 8 earthquake. The last major quake to the hit the country, which left more than 400 people dead in April 2010, was magnitude 7.1.
But despite its grandeur, not everyone is pleased. The fact that it cuts the distance between Qingdao and Huangdao by only 19 miles -- and chops a mere 20 minutes off the daily commute -- has been a bone of contention to some Chinese tax payers, claiming that it's a waste of money.
The previous holder of the longest-bridge record was the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway in Louisiana, United States, with a 24-mile-long bridge dangling over the massive Pontchartrain; the second-largest saltwater lake in the United States.
The new record now means that China holds both the land and water records for colossal bridges. The top three land bridges, including the longest bridge in the world -- the 102 mile Danyang-Kunshan Grand Bridge -- are all found within the People's Republic.
China's brand new record may soon be eclipsed, however by China. Since 2009, a 31-mile-long, £6.5 billion bridge is being built over the Pearl River Delta to link Hong Kong to the Chinese mainland. That monster structure is due for completion in 2016.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
