Chiche Bridge

Chiche Bridge
Puente Chiche
Quito, Pichincha, Ecuador
449 feet high / 137 meters high
689 foot span / 210 meter span
2015

One of South America's most beautiful bridges, the Chiche Bridge is the largest structure on the access highway to the Mariscal Sucre International Airport in Quito, Ecuador. Leaping between two cliffs, several designs were studied before the engineers decided on a frame bridge with inclined piers. The sleek and stealthy design is by Grupo .Located at an elevation of meters, the 315 meter long bridge has 6 lanes and is located just a kilometer upstream of the older 2-lane Chiche truss bridge which is still jammed with local traffic traveling between two large mesas east of Quito, the highest capital city in the world.

Work was contracted in 2012 with the Public Metropolitan Enterprise of Mobility and Public Works of Quito (Ecuador) for $35 million. Its two three-lane decks are 315 m long with a central span of 175 m. Successive cantilevers in the central span and variable depth formwork in the access spans. The maximum height from the top of the deck to ground is 137 m. The works are scheduled to be finished in 2014, after 15 months.