On Sunday, the ceremony for the opening of Norway’s second largest bridge was held, which was built by a Chinese company and its partners around 220 km within the Arctic Circle. With a total length of 1533 meters and a free span of 1145 meters, the Halogaland Bridge near the Norwegian port of Narvik is the longest suspension bridge in the Arctic Circle.
The Sichuan Road and Bridge Group (SRBG) supplied the steel structures and was responsible for the bridge assembly, which contributes to a significant shortcut on the European Route E6. The E6 is the north-south main road through Norway and the west coast of Sweden.
„It was great to see Chinese involvement in this project,“ Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg said at the inauguration ceremony on the Halogaland Bridge over the Rombaken Fjord.
„It’s a very nice bridge that’s very important to the local community,“ she said.
The Chinese ambassador to Norway, Wang Min, who also attended the inauguration ceremony, said the bridge had shown the efforts of Chinese companies to carry out the New Silk Road Initiative.
The project „is an important outcome of the mutually beneficial cooperation between China and Norway,“ Wang said, „and it will be an important example to further promote economic and trade cooperation between the two countries.“
In 2013, SRBG won the contract for the bridge in fierce competition with the world’s leading construction companies.
The steel contract included the prefabrication of all parts: cables, steel boxes and construction on site. The steel parts were produced in four different factories in China.
