Bridge Of Water

13 Responses to "Bridge Of Water"

  1. Superb Pic. I have never seen this before!

  2. whatta bridge! Was that real?!

  3. its in magdeburg germany...the only one in the world like this

  4. At first I cant believe this but when I search it and found it in Germany I then believe it. Very fantastic!

  5. excellent!!

  6. Woah, that's incredible!

  7. wow.this is soo awsome. its very rare.!!

  8. uh... its not that rare, its called a Viaduct, the Roman's had them and there are many in Europe.....

  9. Sorry Dave, it's not a Viaduct; it's an Aqueduct.
    You're right though - there are many of them in Europe - all over the world in fact.

    If anyone wants to see pictures of more, just look up "aqueduct" in Wikipedia, or just Google "aqueduct".

  10. aquaduct

  11. well, they look cool but seriously a bridge that holds water? What about it makes it so efficient or interesting that it is really nesisary?

  12. Nicole, it's most likely part of a canal network, which was used for transportation before railroads.
    One issue with canals is you need a flat surface, otherwise you have to have a series of locks to raise/lower boats onto different levels of a canal.
    By building a bridge in this way over dry land (like a valley), a canal can stay on one level, and you don't need a series of locks to drop the boat down to valley level, and then another set to raise it back up again. So the boats can go straight without stopping, since locks are very time consuming.
    In this case, the bridge is taking the canal over a river. Can you imagine what would happen if the canal joined the river at the same level? It would be a nightmare of navigation to exit the canal, enter the current of the river pushing at your boat from the side, and then trying to re-enter the canal on the other bank. That's in addition to needing the locks to get up/down to the river level, as I mentioned before.
    If you want to know more about such things, read up on the history of the canal system in upstate New York, which connected New York City to the Great Lakes before the era of rail-roads. I believe there is even a similar water-filled bridge in Rochester.

    Now with more modern modes of transportation, one might argue that canals in general are not necessary anymore. But it made sense at the time they built it.

    Long story short, if in the future you see something where someone went to a lot of trouble, there is probably a reason.

  13. @J.Kyle... can it, wise man.

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