This New Bridge in China Has Broken 10 World Records At Once. It’s Patrolled by Robots, There Are No Goods in the World

On June 30, a bridge from Shenzhen to Zhongshan opened in China, which is already being called an architectural wonder.

And he immediately broke 10 world records, although quite distinctive ones. But his main formulation was that in fact this is not quite a bridge in its usual state.

Now let’s talk about what I mean, what is unique about this project and what records it broke.

Briefly

• What records were set
  Why was the bridge built?
  Why construction is being delayed
  What makes the tunnel unique?
  How the Chinese reacted to the new bridge
  There are no similar projects in the world

What records were set

The Shenzhen-Zhongshan Highway has set 10 world records, all of which are quite unusual:

1️⃣ The longest span of a steel box girder sea suspension bridge (1,666 meters)

2️⃣ tallest The world’s longest span sea suspension bridge (91 meters)

3️⃣ Highest carbon clearance for a sea bridge

4️⃣ Largest anchoring device for a suspension sea bridge (344,000 m³)

5️⃣ The highest aerodynamic resistance of a suspension bridge to wind (83.7 meters per second)

6️⃣ Largest steel bridge deck covered with hot-laid asphalt concrete and epoxy binder (378,800 m²)

7️⃣ The longest two-way eight-lane immersed pipe tunnel (5035 meters)

8️⃣ The widest underwater tunnel made of steel shell-concrete submersible pipes (up to 55.6 meters)

9️⃣ The largest single-volume casting of a steel-lined immersion pipe made of self-compacting concrete (29,000 m³ per pipe section)

🔟 The widest multiple folding M-shaped water seal located at the last junction of the tunnel with immersion pipes (3 meters)

In addition, the bridge builders were able to lay 22.6 thousand m² of asphalt in one day, which is equivalent to 50 basketball courts.

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Why was the bridge built?

Shenzhen-Zhongshan Bridge highlights red dot

The Shenzhen-Zhongshan Bridge runs through the Pearl River Delta, one of the most densely populated areas in the world, home to Macau, Hong Kong, and China’s largest cities, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Zhongshan. A total of 70 million people.

All these cities and regions were located on different banks of the Pearl River, which made travel between them very difficult.

In 2009, the idea of ​​building a road connecting the cities on both banks emerged. These cities were Shenzhen and Zhongshan.

But construction of the road began only in 2017 and was completed in 2024. $6.7 billion was spent on the project..

The Shenzhen-Zhongshan Bridge goes into an underwater tunnel in the middle of the river.

The road is 24 km long. The bridge itself actually consists of two bridges on each side, between which are two artificial islands connected by an underground tunnel.

All drivers have access to 8 lanes (4 in each direction) along the 24 km stretch, on which speeds of up to 100 km/h can be reached. The new road turns from Shenzhen International Airport to Zhongshan in 2 hours to 30 minutes.

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Why construction is being delayed

An artificial island where the entrance to the tunnel is located

Despite the fact that the idea to connect the two banks of the Pearl River appeared back in 2009, construction was postponed for more than 10 years, and there were several reasons for this.

Although the road connects two cities, it will be used by residents of other cities on both sides of the river. The border between the two is made up of three different territories: mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau. The latter two are semi-autonomous regions of China, each with its own immigration laws, legal systems, and currency.

In addition, the region’s residents hold three passports from different countries and speak different dialects of Chinese: Cantonese and Mandarin. They even drive on different roads. In China, they drive on the right side of the road, while in Hong Kong and Macau, they drive on the left.

All of this complicates travel between the territories. Some of these problems became apparent when the $20 billion Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge opened in 2018. It is the world’s longest sea bridge, at 55 km.

Shenzhen-Zhongshan Bridge

In 2019, a year after its launch, only 4,000 encounters were registered across the bridge each day. This is very little. By comparison, the Channel Tunnel in Europe, which connects France and the UK, registers an average of 8,000 vehicles per day.

Experts explained the low activity required for passengers to obtain different visas and register vehicles for travel between different places. In addition, ferries regularly travel from one bank to the other, and for many, the ferry crossing is closer than the bridge.

The construction of the Shenzhen-Zhongshan bridge was still decided to begin because China makes a large supply to this region. First of all, from an economic point of view. There are many production facilities and headquarters of various Chinese companies, such as Tencent and DJI.

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What makes the tunnel unique?

Entrance to the tunnel

The two artificial connections are connected by an underwater tunnel. It is equipped with switches for controlling fire extinguishing and smoke removal.

He is regularly patrols a team of 14 robotswhich monitors pipes and cables and records accidents. If an accident occurs, the robots can record what is happening on built-in cameras and immediately send the video to the control center. And with the help of built-in speakers, they can regulate traffic.

There is LED lighting along the wall. When everything is OK inside, the green light is on. In designated areas, it changes to red. During an evacuation, the light can alternate between yellow and green to help people find their way out.

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How the Chinese reacted to the new bridge

Many residents were looking forward to the opening of the bridge, especially those who regularly traveled between Shenzhen and Zhongshan.

The truck drivers were the most pleased with it, as they could significantly reduce their costs between cities.

The roadside is lined with cars that have stopped to look at the city.

The excitement at the opening of the bridge was very great. Hong Kong residents sent by bus across the border in the first chapter on the new route traveled to Zhongshan for 6 hours instead of the expected 90 minutes. All because of the huge traffic jams that had accumulated at both ends of the bridge and approached the roads.

A South China Morning Post journalist decided to travel on the bridge’s opening day. At 2:00 p.m., he took a bus to Hong Kong. At 3:20 p.m., he passed customs at the port of Shenzhen.

Traffic jam in the tunnel

When approaching the bridge, the bus crashed into a big traffic jam for 3 hours. It arrived at the tunnel only at 18:25, and entered the tunnel itself at 7 pm. The bus arrived in Zhongshan at 20:05.

There were a huge number of cars on the bridge. Many stopped on the side of the road to look at the city and take photos.

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There are no similar projects in the world

Shenzhen-Zhongshan Bridge

Most of the projects between Shenzhen and Zhongshan are unique primarily because there are simply no other similar projects in the world, and it is not a fact that they will appear.

In this case, several factors coincided at once, which prompted China to build the bridge.

And although there were huge traffic jams in the first days because most people just wanted to drive across the bridge they had been waiting for 7 years, locals are still happy about its opening.

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