Padma bridge's 3.9km visible

About 3,900 metres of the much-hyped Padma bridge became visible after the installation of the 26th span on Tuesday morning.

The span was installed on pillar no 28 and 29 of the bridge around 9:15am in Shariatpur’s Zajira point, said Humayun Kabir, deputy assistant engineer of the Padma bridge project.

Earlier, the 150-meter long span was taken to Shariatpur point from Mawa point on Monday by floating crane.

Road transport and bridges minister Obaidul Quader said all the spans of the 6.15-kilometre bridge will be installed by July 2020 and the bridge will be opened to traffic by 2021. Only 15 out of 41 spans are left to be installed.

Once in operation, the Padma Bridge, Bangladesh’s largest infrastructure project till date, will connect 21 southern districts with the capital and boost the GDP by 1 per cent.