China’s Bijie bridge, likely to be world’s highest, almost ready

Chinese engineers have completed the structure of what is expected to become the world’s highest bridge, local authorities said.

Chinese engineers have completed the structure of what is expected to become the world’s highest bridge, local authorities said.

Workers complete a bridge that connects two provinces in China’s Guizhou Province, on September 10, 2016. At 565 m above a river, it is the world’s highest bridge. (Reuters)

The Beipanjiang Bridge, in mountainous southwestern China, soars 565 metres above a river, the Guizhou provincial transport department said in a statement on Sunday.

It overtakes the Si Du River Bridge in the central province of Hubei to become the world’s highest bridge, the statement added.

An aerial view of the bridge that will connect two provinces in Bijie, Guizhou Province, China, on September 10, 2016. The construction spans 1341 metres, and is expected to open by the end of 2016. (Reuters)

The two ends of the bridge were linked on Saturday, it added.

The 1,341-metre span is expected to open to traffic at the end of this year and will cut road trips from Liupanshui in Guizhou to Xuanwei in neighbouring Yunnan province from around five hours to less than two, state broadcaster China Central Television reported on Monday.

Several of the world’s highest bridges are in China, although the world’s tallest bridge — measured in terms of the height of its own structure, rather than the distance to the ground — remains France’s Millau viaduct at 343 metres tall.