Recently, the results of the NCE International Awards, organized by the British Institution of Civil Engineers, were announced. The Oujiang North Estuary Bridge in Wenzhou, which was designed with the participation of the China Railway Major Bridge Reconnaissance & Design Institute and built by the China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group, was selected for the award.
NCE, an internationally renowned civil engineering journal, holds significant influence in the civil engineering industry across Europe and globally. The NCE International Bridge Awards gave high praise to the Oujiang North Estuary Bridge, describing it as a breakthrough in suspension bridge design innovation and a benchmark for future bridge design and construction.
The Oujiang North Estuary Bridge spans a total length of 7.913 kilometers, with a main span of 2×800 meters. It employs a dual-bridge structure, with the upper layer serving as a highway and the lower layer as a national road. The bridge boasts three world-first achievements: it is the world's first three-tower, four-span, double-decked steel truss suspension bridge; the first multi-tower continuous span suspension bridge with a rigid concrete middle tower; and the first large-scale deep mud concrete caisson foundation in a tidal estuary. Construction of the bridge began in January 2016, and it officially opened to traffic in May 2022.
China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group was primarily responsible for the construction of the bridge's middle tower, which took four years to complete, from November 2016 to the tower's topping out in November 2020. The construction team worked tirelessly, overcoming numerous challenges to complete the manufacturing, floating, sinking of the steel caisson, and the casting of the main tower, ensuring that the "backbone" of the bridge stood firm over the Oujiang River.
