Jiaozhou Bay Bridge

Jiaozhou Bay Bridge
Coordinates 36°10′12″N 120°17′54″E / 36.169913°N 120.298305°E / 36.169913; 120.298305Coordinates: 36°10′12″N 120°17′54″E / 36.169913°N 120.298305°E / 36.169913; 120.298305
Carries Motor vehicles
Crosses Jiaozhou Bay
Locale between Qingdao and Huangdao District, China
Characteristics
Design Self-anchored suspension bridge and Cable-stayed bridge
Material Prestressed concrete
Total length 26.707 kilometres (16.595 mi)[1]
Width 35 m (115 ft)
Longest span Cangkou Channel Bridge:
260 m (850 ft)
Clearance below 190 m × 40.5 m (623 ft × 133 ft)
History
Designer Shandong Gaosu Group
Construction begin late 2007
Construction end early 2011
Construction cost CN¥10 to 55 billion [2]
Opened 30 June 2011
Jiaozhou Bay Bridge
Simplified Chinese 胶州湾大桥
Traditional Chinese 膠州灣大橋
Literal meaning Jiaozhou Bay Bridge

Jiaozhou Bay Bridge (or Qingdao Haiwan Bridge) is a 26.7 km (16.6 mi) long roadway bridge in eastern China's Shandong province, which is part of the 41.58 km (25.84 mi) Jiaozhou Bay Connection Project.[1] As of December 2012, Guinness World Records lists the Jiaozhou Bay Bridge as the world's longest bridge over water (aggregate length) at 41.58 km (25.84 mi).[3]

Description

The Jiaozhou Bay Bridge transects Jiaozhou Bay, which reduces the road distance between Qingdao and Huangdao by 30 km (19 mi), compared with the expressway along the coast of the bay, reducing travel time by 20 to 30 minutes.[4] The design of the bridge is T-shaped with the main entry and exit points in Huangdao and the Licang District of Qingdao. A branch to Hongdao Island is connected by a semi-directional T interchange to the main span.[5] The construction used 450,000 tons of steel and 2.3 million cubic metres (81×10^6 cu ft) of concrete.[4] The bridge is designed to be able to withstand severe earthquakes, typhoons, and collisions from ships.[4] It is supported by 5,238 concrete piles.[6] The cross section consists of two beams in total 35 m (115 ft) wide carrying six lanes with two shoulders.

The Jiaozhou Bay Bridge has three navigable sections: the Cangkou Channel Bridge to the west, the Dagu Channel Bridge to the east, and the Hongdao Channel Bridge to the north. The 600 metres (2,000 ft) long Cangkou Channel Bridge has 260 m (850 ft) the largest span of the entire Jiaozhou Bay Bridge. The Hongdao Channel Bridge has a span of 120 m (390 ft). The non-navigable sections of the bridge have a span of 60 m (200 ft).[1]

Length

The length of the Jiaozhou Bay Bridge is 26.7 km (16.6 mi), of which 25.9 km (16.1 mi) are over water.[1] It is part of a new 28 km (17 mi)-long section of the Qingdao to Lanzhou highway.[7]

The Jiaozhou Bay Bridge is part of the Jiaozhou Bay Connection Project, which includes overland expressways and the Qingdao Jiaozhou Bay tunnel. The aggregated length of the project is 41.58 km (25.84 mi), which is by many sources listed as length of the Jiaozhou Bay Bridge.[4][8][9][10]

The Jiaozhou Bay Connection Project consists of two non-connected sections: a 35.4 km (22.0 mi)-long expressway that includes the Jiaozhou Bay Bridge and a 6.17 km (3.83 mi)-long expressway that includes the Qingdao Jiaozhou Bay Tunnel.[11]

The 35.4 km (22.0 mi) section is further broken into multiple parts:[11]

Records

Guinness World Records lists the Jiaozhou Bay Bridge at 41.58 km (25.84 mi), which makes it the longest bridge over water (aggregate length), and the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway is at 38.44 km (23.89 mi) the longest bridge over water (continuous length) (status July 2011).[3][12] The Guinness title will be challenged by the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge, which is currently under construction and scheduled to be opened in 2016 with an aggregate 50.0 km (31.1 mi) of bridges and tunnels.

The bridge builder Shandong Gaosu Group claims that Jiaozhou Bay Bridge has the first oversea interchange in the world and that it has the world's largest number of oversea bored concrete piles.[6][13]

History

The bridge was the idea of a local official in the Chinese Communist Party who was subsequently dismissed for corruption.[14] It was designed by the Shandong Gaosu Group. It took four years to build, and employed at least 10,000 people.[4] It opened on 30 June 2011 for traffic.[8]

The Qingdao Jiaozhou Bay tunnel opened on the same day as the bridge.[5][11] It transects Jiaozhou Bay, also connecting Huangdao District and the city of Qingdao, between the narrow mouth of the bay, which is 6.17 km (3.83 mi) wide. The tunnel travels underground for 5.55 km (3.45 mi).[15]

Concerns regarding the bridge's safety were raised when Chinese media reported that the bridge was opened with faulty elements, such as incomplete crash-barriers, missing lighting, and loose nuts on guard-rails, with workers stating that it would take two months before finishing all of the projects related to the bridge.[16] Shao Xinpeng, the bridge's chief engineer, claimed that in spite of the safety report, the bridge was safe and ready for traffic, adding that the problems highlighted in the reports were not major.

The bridge was reported by the official state-run television company CCTV to cost CN¥10 billion (US$1.5 billion, GB£900 million). Other sources reported costs as high as CN¥55 billion (US$8.8 billion, GB£5.5 billion).[2]

A year after opening, the bridge had few users and was described as China's "bridge to nowhere".[14] Built for a projected 30,000 vehicles a day, it was only carrying 10,000.[14]

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Qingdao Haiwan Bridge.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 青岛海湾大桥设计创新技术 en: Qingdao Bay Bridge Design-Innovation-Technologie, retrieved 4 July 2012
  2. 1 2 Staff writers (30 June 2011). "A marathon span: China opens world's longest bridge over water". MSNBC. Retrieved 11 May 2012.
  3. 1 2 "Longest bridge over water (aggregate length)". Guinness World Records. 2012. Retrieved 10 December 2012.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 David Eimer (8 January 2011). "China builds world's longest bridge". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 1 July 2011.
  5. 1 2 "Qingdao bridge sets world record". China Economic Net. 1 July 2011. Retrieved 1 July 2011.
  6. 1 2 "Innovation of Qingdao Bay Bridge", accessed 5 July 2012
  7. ↑ Brief Introduction to QingDao Bay Bridge, accessed 5 July 2012
  8. 1 2 An (30 June 2011). "World's longest cross-sea bridge opens in east China". Xinhua. Retrieved 1 July 2011.
  9. ↑ Uri Friedman (30 June 2011). "A Visual Tour of the World's Longest Sea Bridge". The Atlantic Wire. Retrieved 1 July 2011.
  10. ↑ Staff writers (30 June 2011). "A marathon span: China opens world's longest bridge over water". MSNBC. Retrieved 1 July 2011.
  11. 1 2 3 "Jiaozhou Bay Connection Project" (in Chinese). Retrieved 10 December 2012.
  12. ↑ "Longest bridge over water (continuous length)". Guinness World Records. 2012. Retrieved 10 December 2012.
  13. ↑ "海湾大桥建设有新进度海上钻孔出创三项纪录 (Bay Bridge construction progress of offshore drilling invasive three records)" (in Chinese). China Highway. Retrieved 10 December 2012.
  14. 1 2 3 Rabinovitch, Simon (16 July 2012). "China: The road to nowhere". The Financial Times. Retrieved 11 August 2012.
  15. ↑ "Jiaozhou bay Tunnel in Qingdao". STEC. 8 March 2012. Retrieved 5 July 2012.
  16. ↑ Staff writers (7 July 2011). "China's record-breaking Jiaozhou bridge 'is safe'". BBC News. Retrieved 11 May 2012.
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