Filed under: Etc., Safety, Canada
Spanning 10 lanes of traffic, the Port Mann Bridge (shown in the rendering above) just outside of Vancouver, Canada is currently the widest bridge in the world. Unfortunately, it might also hold a new record for the shortest period of time a new bridge has remained open.
The cable-stayed bridge just opened to full traffic earlier this month, but on Wednesday it was shut down due to massive chunks of ice falling from the cables and striking vehicles, which sent at least two people to the hospital. According to CBC News, the bridge has since reopened to traffic, but apparently nothing has been done about the falling ice as the Vancouver area is slammed with a severe winter storm.
Construction of the bridge began back in 2009 at a cost of more than $3 billion, but it isn’t clear if any changes are needed to prevent this sort of damage from happening in the future. Images of vehicles posted on The Province show damage that ranges from shattered windows and windshields to some pretty intense body damage. Scroll down to watch a news report from CBC News as well as a time-lapse video of the bridge’s construction from August 2009 through January 2012.
New Vancouver bridge closed because design causes “ice bombs” to rain down on cars [w/video] originally appeared on Autoblog on Sat, 22 Dec 2012 10:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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