December 15, 2004

Tallest highway bridge in the world, and 15 years in the making, the Millau Viaduct opens tomorrow. It crosses the Tarn River valley at a deck height of 807 ft (246 m), more or less, depending on your source for the numbers. The towers have a height of 1,118 ft (341 m). The press has posted their typical microscopic photos for the plebes, so I tried digging around for better pix: 1, 2, 3, 4. Any better/newer ones?
posted by rolypolyman 20 years ago
  • And one comment: I found the designer comment interesting: "The pillars had to look almost organic, like they had grown from the earth." Eh?
  • that's a serious frickin' bridge... these french chappies don't muck about, do they?
  • This gives a sense of the location. And some very nice photos here, unfortunately spoiled by the overlay.
  • Two words. BASE jumping.
  • The Wikipedia article has a couple of nice pictures.
  • So, why the bridge over what looks to be pretty flat land? Or is the perspective throwing me off in all the photos?
  • Thank you for the photos. The bridge looks more and more beautiful the further away one gets from it.
  • cool! the photos are awesome. thanks
  • ) for bridges.
  • Wow ... My dad designed bridges so I've always loved them - and this is especially cool, esp as my first holiday without parents was cycling from London to the Tarn valley. It would be vg to cycle over this bridge, I may have to go back!
  • The bridge is built over the Tarn valley and is supposed to cut the car journey from Paris to the Mediterranean by 4 hours. Some more pics can be found here; http://www.manzonderkop.be/Post/?P_ID=5323 and a decent BBC story that covers it can be found here; http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4091813.stm including a link to some cool pics and a BBC news video story on the bridge. Enjoy!
  • "Motorists are expected to pay 4.6 euros (
  • I want to go there. I will drive back and forth. For days perhaps. Back and forth.
  • Unfortunately I see in the pix that stirfry posted that there's a hellish 10 ft tall grate on each side of the roadway... which doesn't afford much of a view.
  • the bridge actually looks pretty small to me.
  • So, why the bridge over what looks to be pretty flat land? Or is the perspective throwing me off in all the photos? Knickers: I'm with you on this, can't quite see why they didn't run long looping curves down the aproach side, and then do some leveling and curves on the near side. But then IANACE, so waddaIno. Long sweeping curves would have been cool to drive though.