Two pieces of a highway bridge over the Amur River linking Russia and China have been successfully connected after workers from both sides tightened the last bolts of the concrete block linking the massive structure on Friday.
The 2,209-meter-long (1.4 miles) bridge, connecting the Russian city of Blagoveshchensk with the Chinese city of Heihe, in the country’s northern-most Heilongjiang province, will provide citizens of the neighboring countries with a two-lane highway.
The ambitious project, which has been implemented under the terms of the concessionaire agreement between Beijing and Moscow, was started in December 2016, when the countries launched a Chinese-Russian joint venture on a parity basis.The new connection is set to boost the export potential of Russia’s Amur region, according to Vasily Orlov, who heads the federal district. The agriculture and derived products are reportedly the region’s competitive advantage. The governor highlighted that 40 percent of soy grown in the region in 2018 was exported to China.