Champlain China Watch: Build bridges where you can

~ By Taviana MacLeod

Since July 2011, six major bridges have collapsed in China according to Chinese Xinhua news agency. The most recent event occurred on August 24^th when the Yangmingtan Bridge in Harbin City (15.42 km long and eight lanes wide) killed three people and injured five. What’s really surprising about this is the fact that this multi-million dollar bridge was built only nine months ago – the same amount of time that the 1,344,130,000 people of China spent being carried around in their mother’s tummies. It was said, according to BBC news, that Shoddy construction and over-loading have been blamed for the incident and that other bridges and roads will now be checked around the country. The New York Times states that “many in China have attributed the recent spate of bridge collapses to corruption…”… meaning that these problems may be due to political dishonesty of the state. Only a week prior to this, on August 15^th, a road in China's northeastern city of Harbin collapsed, creating a 10 meter deep hole that killed two people. Another example of this is the Wuyishan Gongguan Bridge that opened in 1999 which collapsed under a tour bus carrying 23 people on July 15, 2011 in the city of Wuyishan. Could it all be about the politics?... Considering that the Great Wall of China was built over 2,000 years ago and is still standing, you’d think that the Chinese could build a bridge that can stay up!