At 11:18 a.m. on the 16th, with the lifting of the last steel-concrete composite girder into place, the Chibi Yangtze River Highway Bridge—the world's longest-span steel-concrete composite girder cable-stayed bridge—was successfully closed. The bridge is invested in and built by Hubei Communications Investment Group and constructed by China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group. It is expected to be completed and open to traffic on the eve of July 1 this year. By then, the journey from Chibi in Xianning to Honghu in Jingzhou will take only 5 minutes, which will help advance the integrated development of the urban agglomeration in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and support Hubei in "building a strategic fulcrum, staying at the forefront, and writing a new chapter."

Misty Rain Does Not Hinder Bridge Closure

On the 16th, a fine drizzle and thin mist shrouded the Chibi Yangtze River Highway Bridge construction site. A Jimu News reporter, wearing a safety helmet, took a construction elevator up to the bridge deck. Looking across to the opposite bank, Honghu City came into view.

Relevant leaders from Hubei Communications Investment Group, China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group, Xianning City, Jingzhou City, Chibi City, and Honghu City, as well as heads of the Yueyang Maritime Safety Administration, Xi'an Fangzhou Consulting Engineering Company, China Railway Baoqiao Company, Changsha University of Science and Technology, and related units, witnessed the bridge closure.

Mr. Chen Tiansheng, a Chibi-born entrepreneur and the first person to propose planning the Chibi Yangtze River Bridge, also came to the site.

After the bridge closure, Sheng Wenjun, member of the Standing Committee of the Xianning Municipal Party Committee and Secretary of the Chibi Municipal Party Committee, and Li Gan, Vice Mayor of Jingzhou City, shook hands at the closure point in celebration.

Setting Multiple World Firsts

A person in charge of the Xianning project cluster of Hubei Communications Investment Group introduced that the Chibi Yangtze River Highway Bridge is a river-crossing control project of the Taizhou-Xiaojin Highway in the National Highway Network Plan and the Hubei Provincial Skeleton Highway Network Plan, and is also one of the first batch of 80 demonstration projects in infrastructure and other fields encouraged by the National Development and Reform Commission for social capital participation in construction and operation.

The Chibi Yangtze River Highway Bridge starts in Shuifu Village, Wulin Town, Honghu City, and ends in Pu'an Village, Chibi Town, Chibi City. It has a total length of 11.2 kilometers, including a 3.35-kilometer Yangtze River bridge and a 1,380-meter main bridge. The entire line is built to a two-way, six-lane expressway standard with a design speed of 100 kilometers per hour, adopting a 720-meter main span twin-tower symmetric composite girder cable-stayed bridge scheme.

The main towers of the bridge adopt an "H"-shaped design, with the north main tower 217.33 meters high and the south main tower 223 meters high. The project innovated design methods and construction techniques, overcoming world-class challenges such as mass concrete pouring for large pile caps, one-time vertical transmission of concrete for super-high main towers, and control of cable forces and completed-bridge alignment for the 720-meter long-span steel-concrete composite girder, achieving multiple world firsts.

Boosting Regional Economic Development

Since construction began in March 2018, the Chibi Yangtze River Bridge has experienced the combined impact of catastrophic floods and the COVID-19 pandemic. Hubei Communications Investment Group has shouldered its responsibilities and moved forward against the odds, while all construction participants have risen to difficulties and overcome obstacles, ensuring high-quality and efficient progress of the project.

The bridge will become an important node of the Wuhan metropolitan area ring expressway and expressways such as Suiyue, Huyu, Hanhongjian, Beijing-Hong Kong-Macao, and Hangrui, enabling seamless connection between the transportation of Honghu and Chibi and the national transportation network, and playing an important role in promoting the "densification, interconnection, and quality improvement" of Hubei's expressway network. Together with the Jiayu Yangtze River Bridge, the Chibi Yangtze River Bridge will form a dual-channel river-crossing transportation pattern linking southern Hubei and the Jianghan Plain, which is of great significance for driving regional economic and social development. It will help advance the integrated development of the urban agglomeration in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and support Hubei in "building a strategic fulcrum, staying at the forefront, and writing a new chapter."