On the early morning of May 27, 2026, as the last section of steel-concrete composite beam was precisely embedded in the night sky, the Shituo Yangtze River Bridge spanning the Yangtze River officially closed. The completion of the "throat" project of the entire Chongqing Wanzhou high-speed railway not only means that all 149 bridges along the line are connected, but also breaks the history of bridge construction with four world records, pressing the fast forward button for the joint debugging and testing in the second half of 2026.

Four world records added

This bridge is not an ordinary cross river project, but a super project that combines multiple "world firsts": it is the world's first double tower cable-stayed bridge built by both public and railway, and the first to have a separate main beam design for public and railway on the same floor. Its 6th main tower is 253 meters high, making it the world's tallest twin main tower; The main span is 608 meters, making it the world's largest hybrid beam cable-stayed bridge of the same type.

Intelligent construction solves problems

Faced with the construction challenges of super tall towers and large spans, the construction team adopted the "digital twin" technology to provide support. Through BIM modeling and intelligent monitoring, millimeter level control of the line shape of a 253 meter high tower has been achieved. For complex river operations, the team innovatively applied integrated template technology, which greatly improved the efficiency of high tower construction while ensuring safety. Keywords: Infrastructure Engineering News Network, High Speed Rail Infrastructure

Yuwan Hourly Commuting Circle

The Chongqing Wanzhou high-speed railway is designed with a speed of 350 kilometers per hour and is a key section of the national "Eight Verticals and Eight Horizontals" high-speed railway network, including the Baohai Channel. After the full line is opened to traffic, the travel time from Chongqing to Wanzhou will be significantly reduced to less than 1 hour, completely rewriting the spatial and temporal pattern of the northeastern Chongqing region and injecting strong momentum into the Chengdu Chongqing economic circle.Editor/Gao Xue