Rio-Antirrio Bridge

The Rio-Antirrio bridge , officially the Charilaos Trikoupis bridge after the statesman who first envisaged it, is the World's longest multi-span cable-stayed bridge. It crosses the Gulf of Corinth near Patras, linking the town of Rio on the Peloponnese to Antirrio on mainland Greece.

In 2011, the bridge was featured in an episode of Richard Hammond's Engineering Connections.

Its official name is the Charilaos Trikoupis Bridge. Charilaos Trikoupis was a 19th century Greek prime minister, and suggested the idea of building a bridge between Rio and Antirrio; however, the endeavour was too expensive at the time, when Greece was trying to get a late foot into the Industrial Revolution.

The 2,880 m (9,449 ft) long bridge dramatically improves access to and from the Peloponnese, which could previously be reached only by ferry or via the Isthmus of Corinth at its extreme east end. Its width is 28 m (92 ft) — it has two vehicle lanes per direction, an emergency lane and a pedestrian walkway. Its five-span four-pylon cable-stayed portion of length 2,252 m (7,388 ft) is the world's second longest cable-stayed deck; only the deck of the Millau Viaduct is longer at 2,460 m (8,071 ft). However, as the latter is also supported by bearings at the pylons apart from cable stays, the Rio-Antirrio bridge deck might be considered the longest cable-stayed "suspended" deck.