Steel Buildings| This site is about Steel and the types of Structures and Buildings Steel makes.

Moonlight Towers are unlike street lights that we see today on almost every street corner,  back in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s they were common in smaller cities these electric light towers designed to cover a circle of 3,000 feet .  The light towers provided lighting for a 4 square block area.  Between 1894-95 there were 31 on of these towers installed in and around downtown Austin, of which 17 of the original towers remain and are functional.  The Moonlight Towers are listed in the National Register of Historic Places and were designated as State Archaeological Landmarks.

Moonlight towers are lighting structures designed to illuminate large areas of a city at night.

The structures were popular in the late nineteenth century among smaller cities across the United States and Europe, when standard street-lighting systems — using smaller, shorter, and more numerous lamps — were impractically expensive. The towers were designed to illuminate more city area at once via electric lighting. Arc lamps were the most common method of illumination, though they were known for their exceptionally bright and harsh light.

As regular street lighting grew more popular, the prevalence of moonlight tower systems began to wane.

Moonlight towers in Austin, Texas

Austin, Texas is the only city in the world, known to still operate a system. The towers are 165 feet tall and have a fifteen foot foundation. This type of tower was manufactured in Indiana by Fort Wayne Electric Company and assembled onsite.  In 1894, the City of Austin purchased 31 used lighting towers from Detroit. A single tower cast light from six carbon arc lamps, illuminating a 3000 foot (920 meters) radius circle brightly enough to read a watch.

When first installed, the towers were connected to their own electric generators at the Austin dam (near present day Tom Miller Dam). Over the years they were switched from their original carbon-arc lamps (which were exceedingly bright and time consuming to maintain) to incandescent lamps in the 1920’s, and mercury vapor lamps in the 1930’s. Mercury vapor lighting allowed the installation of a switch at each tower’s base. During World War II, a central switch was installed, allowing citywide blackouts in case of air raids.

In 1993 the city of Austin dismantled the towers and restored every bolt, turnbuckle and guy wire as part of a $1.3 million project, the completion of which was celebrated in 1995 with a city-wide festival.

Each tower weighs in at 2 tons. Most of the structure consists of a triangular metal lattice, commonly used for radio antenna supports today. The lattice sits on top of a single 15-foot pole and so must be secured by guy wires attached to each of the three corners of the lattice and strung outward away from the structure.

above is the Moonlight Tower in Zilker Park the lights are connected to the wooden post seen in the back.

Since 1965 the Moonlight Tower in Zilker Park has served as Austin’s Christmas Tree. The normal guy wires are supplemented by additional strands that contain over 3,300 lights that form a conical "tree" for the entire city. A favorite pastime of young and old alike is to spin under the tree while looking up at the lights, then trying to stand upright and fight off the resulting dizzying sensation.

 The 10th longest bridge in the world as of this posting and 10th on our list is  the 6th October Bridge in Cairo, Egypt.  The bridge is 12.74 miles long, connection part of the city highway to the Cairo International Airport.  The people of Cairo call this bridge, the spinal cord of Cairo because half the city travels on it daily.  The bridge is usually croweded due to everyone useing it and can take as long as 45 minutes to cross when traffic is heavy.  The bridge was under construction for 30 years and was finnaly finnished in 1996.

The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel (CBBT) is a 23 mile long bridge and tunnel system that connects southeastern Virginia with Delmarva Peninsula in the United States.  The bridge connects the following independent cities Virginia Beach, and Norfolk, Virginia to Cape Charles in Northampton County along the eastern shore of Virginia.

The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel uses a combo of tunnels and bridges over two separated shipping channels using four artificial islands built in the bay as portals.

The bridge-tunnel was opened on April 15th, 1964, in August 1987 it was officially named the Lucius J. Kellam Jr. Bridge-Tunnel after one of the civic leaders who worked for its development.  However, it still is best known as Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. 

The bridge part of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel as far as I can know is 15.6 Miles long which is why this bridge is placed at number at the worlds 9th longest bridge and 7th longest over water and 4th longest bridge in the USA and 8th longest that is used by autos. 

The above water part of the bridge was upgraded in 1995-1999 from 2 lanes to a 4 lanes at a cost of $200 million

After the bridge-tunnel opened in 1964, it was selected as One of the Seven Engineering Wonders of the Modern World by American Society of Civil Engineers, however it has been replaced on this list since with more recent engineering wonders. 

The Tianjin Binhai Mass Transit (BMT) (滨海快速) or Jinbin light rail (津滨轻轨) is not like the other bridges on the list so far this one is a light rail fast transit line or a rapid metro train line.  The longest all bridge part of this train line is 16.03 Miles long which makes this the 8th longest bridge in the world and first longest train bridge.  This bridge connects Metropolitan Tianjin to TEDA which are both located in China.

The length of the eastern part of the bridge, from Zhongshanmen to Donghailu, is 28.22 miles, of which, 24.8 miles is elevated, and 3.41 miles is on ground, taking a total of around an hour in either direction. A big portion of the service is alongside with the Jintang expressway. The west part, from Zhongxinguangchang to Zhongshanmen, will be 4.57 miles long, of which, 0.36 miles will be elevated, 0.17 miles will be transition, 4.14 miles will be below ground. The total length of the line will be 32.78 miles, and the Binhai line is the longest rapid transit line in China. The construction work of the west part began in 2004, to be completed in 2008.

The train used for the Binhai Mass Transit can travel up to 62.14 miles per hour, which is the record speed for any rapid transit system in China.  Construction of the bridge/rapid transit line began on May 18th, 2001 and was finished on September 30th, 2003.  The lines where opened in 2004.

 The Donghai Bridge is the second longest cross-sea bridge and the 6th longest bridge in the world.

The bridge was the longest cross-sea bridge in the world for a few years until  Hangzhou Bay Bridge was opened on May 1st, 2008.

The Donghai Bridge (simplified Chinese: 东海大桥; traditional Chinese: 東海大橋; pinyin: Dōnghǎi Dàqiáo; literally "East Sea Grand Bridge") was completed on December 10th, 2005 and has a total length of 20.19 miles it connects Yangshan deep-water port and Shanghai in China. 

The majority of the bridge is low-level viaduct but there are also cable-stayed sections to allow large ships passage. 

Not sure how much steel was used in the construction of this bridge, but as always if I get these figures I will post them or if you have them feel free to comment so everyone can know.

The Runyang Bridge or Rùnyáng Chángjiāng Dàqiáo crosses the Yangtze River in Jiangsu Province, China. 

The bridge consist of two major bridges that link Tangzhou on the north of the river and Zhenjiang on the South.  The bridge is part of the Beijing-Shanghai Expressway. 

The south bridge is a suspension bridge with a span of 4888 ft it is the 3rd longest suspension bridge in the world, and the longest in China up untill 2007 when the Xihoumen Bridge was opened and made it the 2nd longest in china and 4th in the world. 

The main span of the bridge consists of a streamlined orthotropic steel box girder that is 3 metres (10 ft) in depth. The width of the deck is 39.2 metres (129 ft), accommodating 6 traffic lanes and a narrow walkway at each outside edge for maintenance. The height clearance for river navigation is about 50 metres (164 ft).

The north bridge is a cable-stayed bridge with a span of 1332 ft with towers 492 ft abover water level.  In the middle of the two bridges is the island of Sivezhou.  The length of the bridge is 22.16 miles.  The construction of the bridge started in October 2000 and was opened to the public on April 30th, 2005 , it was opened ahead of schedule

The Hangzhou Bay Bridge is the worlds 4th longest bridge 3rd longest over water bridge and the worlds longest Trans-oceanic bridge at 22.17 miles long . 

Construction on this bridge started on June 8th, 2003 and was completed on June 14th, 2007.  The opening ceremony was on June 26th, 2007 even though the bridge was not officially open to the public until May 1st, 2008. This is as of this posting the longest bridge in China and was built to last at least 100 years. 

Hangzhou Bay Bridge is a bridge with cable-stayed bridge portions across the Hangzhou Bay off the east coast of china.  The bridge was built in an s shape so that the annual silver dragon is minimally affected. The bridge has two main spans a 1,470 ft northern span and a 1,043 ft southern span.

The bridge has 6 express lanes in two directions. The speed limit is 62 miles per hour.   Orthotropic steel deck is used on its main spans and five ramp bridges, and was paved with 50 millimeters (2.0 in) epoxy asphalt concrete. 

The bridge uses different colors and flashing lights to keep drivers from getting drowsy and pay attention to the road instead.  Previously the trip from Ningbo to Shanghai and southern Jiangsu involved a detour of around 400 km (249 mi), the bridge reduces that distance to 80 km (50 mi), a reduction of 320 km (199 mi).

The result is that Ningbo, with its port at Beilun, will be able to compete with Shanghai’s port Pudong for international sea freight.

This is just one of the investments China has made in it’s transportation infrastructure in the past few years.  

The bridge is expected to boost tourism in Ningbo.  Again I do not have the figures on how much steel was used in the construction of this bridge but if you get it I will post it,  and as always if you have this information feel free to comment.

 The Third bridge in this series, also the Third longest bridge in the world, and the second longest bridge over water.  The briidge is located in Louisiana, USA,  with a length of 23 Miles it comes in right behind  Lake Pontchatrain Causeway at (23.87 mi) and Bang Na Expressway (33.51 mi). we do not have much info about this bridge and I don’t know how much steel was used in it’s construction but if we get this information I will post it here, feel free to comment if you have these numbers.

The Lake Pontchatrain Causeway

also known as the Causeway is the worlds second longest bridge at 23.87 miles behind the Bang Na Expressway (33.51 mi) , the Causeway is the longest bridge in the world over water as of this posting. 

The Lake Pontchatrain Causeway crosses over Lake Pontchartrain in southern Louisiana, USA.  The bridge connects Metairie, Louisiana, a suburb of New Orleans and Mandeville, Louisiana. 

Although I don’t have the numbers on the amount of steel used in the building of this bridge I do know there are over 9000 concrete pillings supporting the bridge. 

The The Lake Pontchatrain Causeway first opened in 1956 and was at that time a a two-lane span of 1/100th of a mile. bridges was expanded on and re opened on May 10th, 1969. This bridge is a toll bridge and always has been.