April 7, 2009
The deck for Stonecutters Bridge in the New Territories region of Hong Kong was formally completed. This bridge carries the motorway designated as Route 8 across the Rambler Channel and serves as a link between Nam Won Kok, a cape in the southeast corner of Tsing Yi Island, and Stonecutters Island. (Stonecutters Island was an actual island until the 1990s, when it was attached to the Kowloon Peninsula via a major land reclamation project; that peninsula forms the southern part of Hong Kong’s main landmass.)
A ceremony was held to celebrate the completion of the deck for Stonecutters Bridge. Those taking part in this event included Eva Cheng, secretary for transport and housing for Hong Kong’s government. She used the occasion to talk about how Stonecutters Bridge would help accommodate the ever-growing motor vehicles traffic in that section of Hong Kong. Cheng also highlighted the bridge’s strategic proximity to a major port facility in the vicinity of Stonecutters Island. She noted, “Stonecutters Bridge is located next to Kwai Chung Container Terminal, so it will support the logistics industry.”
Stonecutters Bridge was opened to traffic in December of that year. Measuring 5,236 feet (1,596 meters) in length, it is one of the world’s longest cable-stayed bridges. In addition, Stonecutters Bridge’s clearance of 241 feet (73.5 meters) is one of the highest for any bridge across the globe. This level of clearance for Stonecutters Bridge allows larger-than-average vessels to travel safely beneath the structure while making their way to and from Kwai Chung Container Terminal and other port facilities in the area.
Stonecutters Bridge has also achieved renown in other respects. In 2010, for example, the London-based Institution of Structural Engineers selected the bridge as that year’s recipient of the Structural Award in the transportation category.
Photo Credit: Exploringlife (licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license at Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International — CC BY-SA 4.0)
For more information on Stonecutters Bridge, please check out Stonecutters Bridge – Wikipedia
Transportation History 