The Lancang River Railway Bridge is an
arch bridge
An arch bridge is a bridge with abutments at each end shaped as a curved arch. Arch bridges work by transferring the weight of the bridge and its loads partially into a horizontal thrust restrained by the abutments at either side. A viaduct ...
under construction od
Dali-Ruili Railway near city of
Baoshan in western
Yunnan Province
Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the C ...
,
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
. Once completed, the bridge will be one of
the highest in world, sitting above the
Lancang River. The bridge's main span will be making it also
one of the longest arch bridges ever built. The bridge is expected to be completed in 2019.
Design
Instead of using
cable stay
A cable-stayed bridge has one or more ''towers'' (or ''pylons''), from which cables support the bridge deck. A distinctive feature are the cables or stays, which run directly from the tower to the deck, normally forming a fan-like pattern ...
s and
tiebacks to build the arch, the two steel
truss
A truss is an assembly of ''members'' such as beams, connected by ''nodes'', that creates a rigid structure.
In engineering, a truss is a structure that "consists of two-force members only, where the members are organized so that the assembl ...
arch halves were built vertically on either side of the canyon slopes on top of scaffolding. While still in a vertical position, the two halves were then lowered over the gorge where they were connected at the crown. The total length of the bridge is 698 meters.
Site
The site showcases three high spans including an older
suspension bridge
A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck (bridge), deck is hung below suspension wire rope, cables on vertical suspenders. The first modern examples of this type of bridge were built in the early 1800s. Simple suspension bridg ...
, the new railway bridge and a high pipeline suspension bridge that is the third-highest of its type in the world after the
Hegigio Gorge Pipeline Bridge in Papua New Guinea and the
Niouc Bridge in Switzerland.
The official height of the bridge is 271 meters, measured to the river's original surface. The construction of the
Xiaowan Dam
The Xiaowan Dam () is an arch dam on the Lancang (Mekong) River in Nanjian County, Yunnan Province, southwest China. The primary purpose of the dam is hydroelectric power generation and it supports a 4,200 MW power station. Constructed between 200 ...
downstream created a reservoir that extends back under the bridge and raised the water level some 50 meters.
See also
*
List of highest bridges in the world
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to:
People
* List (surname)
Organizations
* List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
* SC Germania List, German rugby union ...
*
List of crossings of the Mekong River
*
List of longest arch bridge spans
This list of the longest arch bridge spans ranks the world's arch bridges by the length of their main span. The length of the main span is the most common way to rank bridges as it usually correlates with the engineering complexity involved in des ...
References
Bridges in Yunnan
Arch bridges in China
Buildings and structures under construction in China
Bridges over the Mekong River
Bridges under construction
Transport in Baoshan, Yunnan
Transport in Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture
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