Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Kjkolb (talk | contribs) at 13:26, 11 January 2006 (not all aqueducts are level, long aqueducts with small elevation differences must be relatively level). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

A viaduct is a bridge that connects points of equal height in a landscape, usually by bridging a river valley or other eroded opening in an otherwise flat area. Often such valleys have roads descending either side (with a small bridge over the river, where necessary) that become inadequate for the traffic load, necessitating a viaduct for through traffic. Such bridges also lend themselves for use by rail traffic, which requires straighter and flatter routes. It gets its name from an analogy with aqueduct, which must be almost level in some cases, while a bridge for people, pack animals or non-rail vehicles can be hump-backed and gain a structural advantage (i.e., less material or design sophistication needed) from that shape.

Some well-known viaducts include:

• Bloor Street Viaduct
• Millau Viaduct
• Glenfinnan Viaduct
• Thelwall Viaduct
• Lethbridge Viaduct
• Cypress Viaduct
• Interstate 805 Viaduct
• Nuselsky most in Prague

This architecture-related article is a stub. You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it.

• v
• t
• e

• Architecture stubs