张家界建造的世界最长玻璃桥

The bridge will be suspended across Zhangjiajie Grand Canyon in scenic Zhangjiajie National Park in central China's Hunan Province.

When completed, project engineers say the bridge will be 300 meters above ground and 430 meters in length. The bridge itself will be six meters wide, with several glass observatories at various ends. Each glass panel of the walkway will be five centimeters thick.

So far, construction workers have completed the preliminary wire framework and foundations for the bridge.

The safety issue of glass bridges or walkways has raised public concerns after cracks were reported at a local glass-bottom walkway in a park in central China's Henan Province during the National Holiday travel rush earlier this month.

The bridge's project manager Guo Kun says there's nothing to worry on the safety front.

"People, especially tourists, will worry a lot about safety since the bridge is all made of glass, but I want to tell everyone that there is no need to worry, because we have done numerous tests, including conducting precise calculation of its carrying capacity when building this glass bridge."

He adds that once the bridge is completed, tourists will be allowed to enjoy the view on the bridge, or even go bungee jumping.

For his part the project's general engineer Ma Liang says the number of people on the bridge at one time will be limited due to ensure safety.

"In accordance with design requirements, we will have a limit on the number of tourists that can walk on the bridge, as we can only have 800 tourists on the bridge at the same time. We will control the number of tourists at the entrances to the site to ensure safety of the bridge."

He adds that the bridge's designers aimed to create a bridge that would be harmonious with its surroundings.

"The glass parts will be transparent and glass-bottomed, so when people are walking on the bridge, they can enjoy the landscape of the canyon below. Meanwhile, the white steel structure also fits properly into the surrounding landscape and the mist in the canyon, which is one of the architect's design concepts."

The construction project cost a total of around 250 million yuan, or about 39 million U.S. dollars.

The bridge should be completed at the end of this year, and will be officially open to tourists next January.

In late September this year, China's first glass-bottom bridge, suspended 180 meters above ground, opened in Hunan's Shiniuzhai National Geological Park.

For CRI, I'm Xie Cheng.