The highest bridge in the UK has opened to traffic for the first time, marking the end of a 10-year, £1.35b building project.
Northbound traffic was diverted to the 210-metre high Queensferry Crossing, on the main road between Edinburgh and Fife, at around 2am on Wednesday morning.
But the fanfare was troubled by delays after a breakdown on the hard shoulder of the bridge caused tailbacks later in the day.
Six years in the making, the new Queensferry crossing is the longest free-standing balanced cantilever bridge in the world, and stretches 1.7 miles between the banks of the Forth.
It uses 35,000 tonnes of steel, 150,000 tonnes of concrete – almost enough cabling to stretch around the equator – and was built by a team from 24 countries.
Its opening was preceded on Monday with a light show, and a procession of vintage and modern vehicles overseen by First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.
Michael Martin, the Project Director of Forth Crossing Bridge Constructors, said build the bridge had been “pretty stressful” at times.
“This has been a challenging job from the outset – building the towers, the tallest bridge towers in the UK, in very hostile conditions,” he explained.
“You are basically in the North Sea and the wind conditions, in the winter in particular, are truly horrible.
“There isn’t a day goes past where you don’t get something thrown at you, a problem to be overcome. But that’s what engineering is about.”
The new bridge is near to the Forth Bridge, a rail crossing built in 1882, and the original road bridge which will now carry cyclists, pedestrians and public transport.
Bad weather delayed the completion of the new bridge by two years. But the crossing has been designed with the weather in mind, with Perspex sheeting to prevent the weather troubling crossing vehicles.
Cabinet Secretary for the Economy Keith Brown, who was among the first people to cross the new bridge in a chorus of car horns early on Wednesday morning, said the design was “fantastic”.
He said: “You immediately notice coming over the new bridge – as traffic is now doing – the absence of the slap, slap, slap that you get on the existing bridge.
“It’s a very smooth passage right across the Queensferry Crossing.”
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