Modern Highway Bridges in China

To meet the demand of rapid economic growth in China, the world' s largest-scale bridge construction will continue to go ahead during the first two decades of the 21st century, including the construction of curved-sloped-inclined bridges with very high piers crossing deep valleys and gorges under the complex topographic and geologic conditions in the western region, large-span bridges crossing rivers and lakes in the midChina region and extra-long bridges with deep water foundation crossing bay and strait along the eastern coast in China. To implement those bridge projects, China will face the new technological challenges of integrated system, combined structure and compound materials. A number of representative bridges started to be built at the beginning of this century and are now under construction, which include over 30km long bay crossing bridges, over 300m-span steel-concrete composite frame girder bridges, over 400m-span steel-concrete composite arch bridges and over 500m-span steel tie-arch bridges, over 1000m-span cable-supported bridges. This paper briefly discusses the background of development plan and new bridge construction in the Mainland China, mainly focusing on representative bridges with innovative technologies of system, structure, material and construction expertise and equipment.