Queen Juliana Bridge, or Koningin Julianabrug in Dutch, is said to be the tallest bridge in the Caribbean. The bridge, connecting the Punda and Otrabanda sides of Willemstad, opened on April 30, 1974, and is named in honor of Juliana of the Netherlands, Queen of the Netherlands from 1948 until she abdicated the throne 1980. On Nov. 6, 1967, during construction of the bridge, a portion of the structure collapsed, killing 15 workers.
The Seven Mile Bridge is perhaps the most famous bridge on the 113-mile-long Overseas Highway through the Florida Keys to Key West. The Florida East Coast Railway build the original bridge, initially known as the Knights Key-Pigeon Key-Moser Channel-Pacet Channel Bridge, from 1909 to 1912 as part of its Key West Extension, also known as the Overseas Railroad. Following the 1935 Labor Day hurricane, the railroad, financially unable to rebuild the route, sold the remaining bridges to the government, which reworked it as a highway. A newer bridge, constructed from 1978 to 1982, replaced the original span, which largely remains in place.
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Of all the landmarks in London, Tower Bridge sits near the top of the list, perhaps trailing only its namesake tower. The bridge, built between 1886 and 1894, crosses the River Thames near the Tower of London. The structure, which features a pair of towers, is unique in that it is both a bascule (draw) and suspension bridge. The Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII, and his wife, Alexandra of Denmark, formally opened the bridge on June 30, 1894. The 800-foot-long crossing, often mistaken for the London Bridge, features a pair of 213-feet-tall towers and a 200-foot-long central span.
When it opened in 1964, the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge (previously misspelled as the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge) was the world’s longest suspension span. The bridge was named after Giovanni da Verrazano. In 1524, he became the first European explorer to sail into New York Harbor. Its 693-foot-tall towers are 1 5/8 inches farther apart at their tops than at their bases because the 4,260-foot-long required engineers to take into the account curvature of the Earth. Each tower weighs 27,000 tons and is held together with three million rivets and one million bolts. Seasonal contractions and expansions of the steel cables cause the double-decked roadway to be 12 feet lower in the summer than in the winter.
The Waco Suspension Bridge opened to traffic in January 1870, making it roughly 13 years older than the more famous Brooklyn Bridge. The 475-foot-long bridge forever changed travel in the area. Built at an estimated cost of roughly $141,000 (estimates vary) and designed by Thomas M. Griffith, the bridge was the first major suspension bridge in the state of Texas.
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The 2,376-foot-long Walnut Street Bridge, constructed between 1889 and 1891, was the first to connect Chattanooga, Tennessee’s downtown with North Chattanooga (or North Shore). According to the Historic American Engineering Record, “The bridge was apparently the first non-military highway bridge across the Tennessee River.” Streetcars formerly ran across the bridge, which was open to vehicle traffic until May 11, 1978. The bridge was the site of two lynchings, Alfred Blount on February 14, 1893, and Ed Johnson on March 19, 1906.