City to rebuild collapsed ancient bridge
21/8/2003 15:13
All the remains of the collapsed Tai'an Bridge in Zhujiajiao, suburbs of
Shanghai, was taken out of the river yesterday, with no single stone broken,
Jiefang Daily reports.
The Zhujiajiao Township government is planning to
reconstruct the bridge in the near future.
Tai'an bridge, built in the
Ming Dynasty, used to be considered as the oldest arch bridge, also the steepest
one, in Shanghai. With a stoop steel tube at the middle of the bridge for quite
a while, it had signaled warnings for repairs. But the government was in such a
hurry to restore the river traffic under the bridge that it only installed
several supporting steel frames to both sides of the bridge, rather than a
complete reshaping.
"It could be damaged by a sudden dash of boats or
others," Yu Wenquan, an official with the township government
analysed.
But deputy head of Zhujiajiao Township, Wang Linjing, said it
was still under investigation as to what kind of damage exactly caused the
collapse of the strong ancient bridge.
Tai'an Bridge had tempered
hundreds of years of natural disasters and still survived.
"All the
stones taken out of the river have been categorized and marked for later
restoration," another official said.
All the eight girders of the bridge
will be replaced with new ones and the reconstruction project is expected to
finish by September 28, before the starting of this year's Zhujiajiao Cultural
and Tourist Festival.
Vicky Xu / Shanghai Daily news
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