Yibin Jinsha River Railway Bridge, the world’s longest road-rail steel box arch bridge, was closed on the morning of June 28 in Yibin, Sichuan province.

The 1874.9-meter bridge adopts a double-layer structure, with a roadway on the lower layer and high-speed rail on the upper layer. Its main span is 336 meters long.

According to a local resident, after the bridge opens, it will only take him five minutes to cross the river instead of 30 minutes by boat.

The construction of the bridge by China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group started in December 2013. It is a key project on the railway linking Sichuan’s capital Chengdu with Guiyang, the capital of Guizhou province. The Chengdu-Guiyang railway, which is expected to open in 2019, is the world’s first high-speed rail line within a mountainous region and is designed for a maximum speed of 250 kilometers per hour.

Once complete, the rail line will shorten travel times between Yibin and Chengdu from six hours to one hour and between Chengdu and Guiyang from 12 to three hours.

An artist's rendition of the bridge