Traveling around, I found that many cities have their own iconic buildings, such as the Statue of Liberty in New York, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the Statue of Jesus in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the Grand Theater in Sydney, etc. These are like business cards of each city. Whenever this city is mentioned, everyone can't help but think of this city's landmark. The Golden Gate Bridge is a well-deserved landmark of San Francisco.
The famous Golden Gate Bridge is one of the most famous bridges in the world and is known as a miracle of modern bridge engineering. Of course, it is also recognized as a landmark and symbol of San Francisco. It has a total length of 2737.4 meters, a width of 27.5 meters, a height of 227.4 meters, and a tower height of 342 meters. The northern end is connected to Northern California, and the southern end is connected to the San Francisco Peninsula. Construction started in 1933 and was completed in May 1937. It took 4 years and more than 100,000 people. tons of steel at a cost of US$35.5 million. The height from the sea to the center of the bridge is about 60 meters. The top of the tower is connected by two steel cables with a diameter of 92.7 centimeters each and a weight of 24,500 tons.
The Golden Gate Bridge, which spans the Kinmen Strait, is shrouded in thick fog all year round, and some little-known stories are hidden in this fog. As early as 1579, British explorer Francis Drake discovered the Golden Gate Strait, a strait connecting the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco. At that time, San Francisco was just an ordinary, depressed town. But with the " gold rush ", this place has expanded into a lively big city with a population of tens of thousands in the blink of an eye. The Gold Rush made the Golden Gate an integral part of California's mystery and charm.
Buildings have sprung up around the bay, and even the desolate peninsula in the northern part of the Kinmen Strait has begun to be inhabited. In the following decades, residents on both sides of the bay continued to travel by ferry. They suffered from traveling and the transportation was very inconvenient. As early as 1872, government lawmakers discussed the idea of building a bridge across the Golden Gate Strait, but to no avail. It was not until 1914 that several reporters who traveled back and forth between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait initiated discussions in newspapers about building a cross-sea bridge across the Golden Gate Strait. At that time, the famous bridge engineer Joseph Strauss always had a dream, that is, to design and build A great bridge, this is a great opportunity.
He drafted the project plan for the Golden Gate Bridge and gradually refined the design plan. It has been 42 years since the bridge construction proposal was first proposed. Bridge engineer Joseph Strauss spent more than a decade lobbying for his dream, lobbying the government to pass the proposal to build the Golden Gate Bridge. However, the proposal has encountered a lot of resistance, and the public has mixed reactions to such a fantasy: some are in favor of it, and of course there are also those who are opposed to it. Everyone has doubts about building such a huge project.
The main resistance comes from the U.S. military. The U.S. Navy is worried that after the completion of the Golden Gate Bridge, it will hinder naval warships from entering and exiting the Golden Gate Bay. If the Golden Gate Bridge collapses due to damage or is attacked by hostile countries, blocking the passage of the Golden Gate Bay, the U.S. warships in the Golden Gate Bay will be blocked. It will become a decoration and a living target.
Another voice of opposition comes from the Southern Pacific Railway Company, which has a ferry business. They are worried that the completion of the bridge will cause a significant reduction in business volume and cause huge economic losses to the company. However, hard work pays off.
After ten years of unremitting efforts, Strauss cleared various relationships, and the proposal to build the Golden Gate Bridge was finally passed in May 1924.
To be continued! Please pay attention to watch "All the great directors racked their brains to "destroy" it but they all competed to let it appear on camera (Part 2)"
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Liu Jie
Travel photographer, freelance writer, cultural landscape photographer, photography tourism project leader, national senior photographer, member of China Photographers Association, member of China Photographic Books Association, fellow of China Folk Photographers Association, Chinese National Geography columnist, "Beautiful China Tour" photographer, headlines contracted author, multiple travel media columnists, Gettylmages/CFP contracted photographer, Panoramic Vision and many other professional website contracted photographers.
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