Bridge Maria Pia

This guide to the Maria Pia Bridge in Porto begins in 1875, when four teams competed to fling a railway bridge across the deep Douro gorge and Gustave Eiffel refused to sink a single pillar into the river. It follows his unusually low bid, and the crews building out from both riverbanks at once on cables anchored into the hillside, closing the gap toward the middle. Picture the single iron arch from the riverbank below, sixty-one meters overhead.