The Golden Gate Bridge: Another American-made engineering marvel
The Oakland-Bay Bridge currently under construction in northern California has been plagued by safety concerns over unsafe welded steel from China. These continuing problems have led to cost overruns and have repeatedly pushed back the timetable for overall completion of the bridge.
In sharp contrast, San Francisco's venerable Golden Gate Bridge (which links northern San Francisco with sunny Marin County) has stood as an international icon since its completion in 1937. Built with quality American-made steel, it continues to guard the entrance to San Francisco Bay while transporting millions of commuters each year.
One of the most photographed bridges in the world, the Golden Gate still possesses the second longest suspension bridge main span in the United States (after the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in New York City) and has been declared one of the modern 'Wonders of the World' by the American Society of Civil Engineers.
The bridge totals 1.7 miles, with a center span of 4,200 feet. The weight of the roadway is hung from two cables that pass through the two main towers and are fixed in concrete at each end. Each cable is made of 27,572 strands of wire, with 80,000 miles of wire in the main cables. The bridge has approximately 1.2 million rivets.
The color of the bridge is officially an orange vermillion called international orange that was was selected because it meshes with the surrounding landscape while standing out during frequent fog cover.
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