From China's 164.8 km Danyang–Kunshan Grand Bridge on down, the world's longest bridges in use — ranked by the total length of a single continuous bridge structure, which means the marathon high-speed rail viaducts of China and Taiwan dominate the top of the list.
How we measure: each length is the end-to-end length of one continuous bridge or viaduct, approaches included, as published for that structure. Only completed bridges currently in use are counted. Crossings broken up by tunnels, artificial islands, or causeway embankments — like the 55 km Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macau link or Kuwait's Sheikh Jaber Causeway — are left out, since no single bridge in them runs that full distance.
Pictured: the Danyang–Kunshan Grand Bridge in Jiangsu, China, #1 at 164.8 km.
| Rank | Bridge | Length | Country | Type | Carries | Opened |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Danyang–Kunshan Grand Bridge — Jiangsu | 164.8 km | China | High-speed rail viaduct | Rail | 2011 |
| 2 | Changhua–Kaohsiung Viaduct | 157.3 km | Taiwan | High-speed rail viaduct | Rail | 2007 |
| 3 | Tianjin Grand Bridge — Langfang to Qingxian | 113.7 km | China | High-speed rail viaduct | Rail | 2011 |
| 4 | Cangde Grand Bridge — Cangzhou to Dezhou | 105.8 km | China | High-speed rail viaduct | Rail | 2011 |
| 5 | Weinan Weihe Grand Bridge — Shaanxi | 79.7 km | China | High-speed rail viaduct | Rail | 2010 |
| 6 | Bang Na Expressway — Bangkok | 54.0 km | Thailand | Elevated expressway | Road | 2000 |
| 7 | Beijing Grand Bridge — Beijing | 48.2 km | China | High-speed rail viaduct | Rail | 2011 |
| 8 | Lake Pontchartrain Causeway — Louisiana | 38.4 km | USA | Lake crossing | Road | 1956 |
| 9 | Wuhan Metro Line 1 — Wuhan | 37.8 km | China | Metro viaduct | Rail | 2004 |
| 10 | Manchac Swamp Bridge — Louisiana | 36.7 km | USA | Swamp crossing | Road | 1979 |
| 11 | Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Skyway — Bekasi to Karawang | 36.4 km | Indonesia | Elevated expressway | Road | 2019 |
| 12 | Yangcun Bridge — Beijing to Tianjin | 35.8 km | China | High-speed rail viaduct | Rail | 2008 |
| 13 | Hangzhou Bay Bridge — Zhejiang | 35.7 km | China | Sea crossing | Road | 2008 |
No matching rows.
Carrying the Beijing–Shanghai High-Speed Railway across the rivers, canals, lakes and rice paddies of Jiangsu province, this concrete viaduct has held the Guinness World Record for the longest bridge of any kind since the line opened in June 2011. Building it took about 10,000 workers roughly four years, at a cost of around $8.5 billion — and trains cross its full length at up to 300 km/h.[1]
Most of Taiwan High Speed Rail's run down the island's west coast rides on this single viaduct, from Baguashan in Changhua County to Zuoying in Kaohsiung. Because Taiwan sits on an active fault zone, it was engineered so trains can stop safely on the structure during an earthquake. The line opened on January 5, 2007, running Japanese Shinkansen-derived trains at up to 300 km/h.[2]
Another link in the Beijing–Shanghai High-Speed Railway, running from Langfang to Qingxian, built from 32-meter box girders that weigh about 860 tons apiece. Engineers chose an elevated line partly to save land: per kilometer, the viaduct needs about 10.9 hectares, versus roughly 28.4 hectares for a conventional railway embankment.[3]
The third of the Beijing–Shanghai line's record-scale viaducts, linking the cities of Cangzhou and Dezhou across the North China Plain. Its 105.81 km length rests on a total of 3,092 piers, and it was finished in 2010, a year before the railway opened to passengers.[4]
Built for the Zhengzhou–Xi'an High-Speed Railway, this viaduct crosses the Wei River twice, along with a string of smaller rivers, highways and railways. When it was completed in 2008 it was briefly the longest bridge in the world — until the even longer Beijing–Shanghai viaducts were finished in 2010. Its line opened to trains on February 6, 2010.[5]
A six-lane elevated toll road running above Highway 34 out of Bangkok, recognized by Guinness World Records as the longest road bridge in the world. It opened on February 7, 2000, at a cost of about $1 billion, and its superstructure is built entirely from precast concrete segments — some 1.8 million cubic meters of concrete in all.[6]
The northern end of the Beijing–Shanghai High-Speed Railway, which means most journeys on the line either begin or finish on this viaduct. Despite its 48.15 km length, no single span is longer than 44 meters — it's a long run of short, repetitive spans rather than one dramatic crossing.[7]
Two parallel bridges carry traffic between Metairie and Mandeville across Lake Pontchartrain, north of New Orleans. The first opened in 1956 at a cost of $46 million and the second in 1969. Guinness recognizes it as the world's longest continuous bridge over water.[8]
An entire metro line raised on one viaduct, from Hankou North to Jinghe, often cited as the longest continuous metro viaduct in the world. When its first section opened on July 28, 2004, Wuhan became only the fifth city in mainland China to have a metro, after Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and Guangzhou.[9]
The longest bridge on the entire US Interstate Highway System, a twin concrete trestle carrying I-55 over Louisiana's cypress swamps since 1979. Its piles were driven as deep as 250 feet into the swamp at about $7 million per mile — and local folklore says the swamp below is haunted by the rougarou, a Cajun werewolf.[10]