Yeli Island drawbridge limited to bus, foot traffic

The New Haiyan Bridge connecting Yeli Island and Central Lovers Avenue in Wanzaisha of Xiangzhou is to come under construction in April and be completed in one year. It will be the first movable bridge in the Pearl River Delta and the sixth in China.

The proposed cross-water channel will supplement the Xinyue Bridge which is open to both vehicular traffic and pedestrians. A cove named Sea & Sky will be formed between the two bridges.

New Haiyan Bridge

Hangzhou Municipal Construction Group recently won the contract after public bidding. The cost will be 110 million yuan ($16 million) and the landscaping 125 million yuan ($18.1 million). 

Rendering of New Haiyan Bridge 

The length of the project will be 707 m, with the bridge section 583 m. Most characterized is a movable steel box girder span designed to allow sand dredging boats to pass through. This will add yet another eye-catching site along Lovers Avenue. Zhang Jincai, section manager of the project department, said the design uses the first domestically initiated technology -- vertically lifting the span through a hydraulic jacking system. As the opening tank is half buried in the seabed, the construction difficulty deals with mass quantity, comparable to that of large-scale bridge piers and abutments.

Yeli Island and Central Lovers Avenue are important parts of Xianglu Bay’s coastal environmental regulatory project. Yeli is to become an island paradise featuring the Zhuhai Opera House, seafront eco-square, yacht service center, and roundabout cycling lane, according to a planning official. 

Rendering of New Haiyan Bridge [File photos]

The new Haiyan Bridge connecting Beili Road on the island can function as the emergency evacuation channel for both the island and opera house, and a route for buses as well as being a slow-traffic path for locals to get in and out of the venue. It is to be open to all motor vehicles only in case of emergency when the dual four-lane bridge will wholly open for urgent evacuation. 

To further enhance the landscaping of Yeli Island and areas near Xiangzhou Port, three waterside squares and two coastal plank roads will be built by Spring Festival next year.