It likely won’t ever get the notoriety of the Golden Gate Bridge, the Brooklyn Bridge or the Mackinac Bridge, but a construction project on a new bridge to connect Canada and the United States is taking shape fairly quickly.
Progress has been rapid for the Gordie Howe International Bridge, a $4.5 billion project named after the legendary hockey player that will provide a passageway for travelers between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario.
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In January, stay cables started to be installed, with 108 of them expected to be installed on both sides for a total of 216, according to a press release from the bridge’s website.
The release said that a stay cable is comprised of rope-like metal strands housed in a high-density polyethylene (HDPE) plastic pipe. The metal strands inside the pipe are stressed and anchored to two points – an anchor box inside the tower and an edge girder on the deck.
Cables deliver the weight of the entire structure to the tower and maintain the stability and placement of the bridge deck.
The towers and stay cables will be capable of supporting millions of pounds of weight.
The bridge tower legs have been joined together on both the Canadian and American sides and are more than 550 feet. The towers are slated to be at a height of 722 feet and should be finished sometime this year.
Check out the photos below, courtesy of the Gordie Howe International Bridge Project. The first photo is a rendering of what the bridge is supposed to look like upon completion.
The bridge is expected to be completed in 2025.
Since 1929, the nearby Ambassador Bridge has been the main connection hub between Detroit and Windsor for truckers and other travelers.