World's longest sea bridge bestrides Hangzhou Bay

A grand ceremony will be held on Tuesday afternoon to mark the linking of the two ends of a trans-oceanic bridge that spans Hangzhou Bay near Shanghai on the east China coast, according to its builders.

The spectacular 36-km-long Hangzhou Bay Bridge starts at Jiaxing, near Shanghai, and ends at Cixi, about 70 km from Ningbo city in Zhejiang Province.

It will go into service before the Beijing Summer Olympic Games begin in August 2008, according to bridge deputy commander-in-chief Jin Jianming.

The world's longest sea bridge, it will cut the length of a road trip from Shanghai to bustling Ningbo from 400 km to just 80km.

Hangzhou Bay Bridge is a cable-stayed structure built at a cost of 11.8 billion yuan (1.42 billion US dollars). Just over half the funds for the bridge's construction have come from China's private sector -- the first time the private sector has invested in a public infrastructure project in China.

Construction of the six-lane bridge, on which motor vehicles will be able to drive at speeds of up to 100 km per hour, began in Nov. 2003.

In the next few months, workers will begin surfacing work on the bridge and will finish by the end of November, said Jin.

The bridge highway has been built to last 100 years, he said.