New state-of-the-art Kelani Bridge named “Golden Gate Kalyani” in Peliyagoda will be declared open tomorrow (November 24).

The event will be held under the patronage of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, Highways Minister Johnston Fernando said.

The six-lane bridge, which aims to ease the traffic congestion in Colombo and suburban areas, is the first-ever to be constructed in Sri Lanka with hi-tech stay cables.

After the Colombo-Katunayake Expressway was declared open, the number of vehicles entering the city of Colombo on a daily basis soared considerably. As the capacity of the existing bridge was inadequate for the large number of vehicles driving across, preliminary plans for a project to construct a new bridge were drawn up in 2014.

Subsequently, the Highways Ministry and the Road Development Authority (RDA) launched the project to construct a new suspension bridge with six lanes adjacent to the existing one.

This bridge features a cable support system that distributes the weight of the deck between two towers. The deck is hung on vertical suspender cables and the main cables, suspended between towers, are connected to the anchorages at each end of the bridge.

“Golden Gate Kalyani” was built under two phases. Rs. 31,539 million was spent under the first phase for the construction of steel bridge section. Meanwhile, the extradosed bridge section was constructed under the second phase with a sum of Rs. 9,896 million.

Funds for the project were granted by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) through a concessionary loan.