The Quebec Bridge (French: pont de Québec) is a road, rail, and pedestrian bridge across the lower Saint Lawrence River between Sainte-Foy (a former suburb that in 2002 became the arrondissement Sainte-Foy–Sillery–Cap-Rouge in Quebec City) and Lévis, in Quebec, Canada. The project failed twice during its construction, in 1907 and 1916, at the cost of 88 lives and additional people injured. The bridge eventually opened in 1919. The Quebec Bridge is a riveted-steel truss structure and is 987 metres (3,238 feet) long, 29 metres (95 ft) wide, and 104 metres (341 ft) high. Cantilever arms 177 metres (581 ft) long support a 195-metre (640 ft) central structure, for a total span of 549 metres (1,801 ft), still the longest cantilever bridge span in the world. (It was the all-categories longest span in the world until the Ambassador Bridge was completed in 1929.) It is the easternmost (farthest downstream) complete crossing of the Saint Lawrence River. The bridge accommodates three highway lanes (there were none until 1929, when one was added; another was added in 1949 and a third in 1993), one rail line (two until 1949), and a pedestrian walkway (originally two). At one time, it also carried a streetcar line. From 1993 until 2024, it was owned by the Canadian National Railway, before it was purchased by the Government of Canada for a symbolic $1. The Quebec Bridge was designated a National Historic Site in 1995.
Background Before the Quebec Bridge was built, the only way to travel from the south shore of the St. Lawrence in Lévis to the north shore at Quebec City was to take a ferry or to use the wintertime ice bridge. The construction of a bridge over the St. Lawrence River at Quebec was considered as early as 1852. It was further discussed in 1867, 1882, and 1884. After a period of political instability during which Canada had four prime ministers in five years, Wilfrid Laurier, the Member of Parliament for the federal riding of Quebec East, was elected on a Liberal platform in 1896 and led the push to build the Quebec Bridge until he left office in 1911. A March 1897 article in the Quebec Morning Chronicle noted:
The bridge question has again been revived after many years of slumber, and business men in Quebec seem hopeful that something will come of it, though the placing of a subsidy on the statute book is but a small part of the work to be accomplished, as some of its enthusiastic promoters will, ere long, discover. Both Federal and Provincial Governments seem disposed to contribute towards the cost, and the City of Quebec will also be expected to do its share. Many of our people have objected to any contribution being given by the city unless the bridge is built opposite the town, and the CHRONICLE like every other good citizen of Quebec would prefer to see it constructed at Diamond Harbor, and has contended in the interests of the city for this site as long as there seemed to be any possibility of securing it there. It would still do so if it appeared that our people could have it at that site. A bridge at Diamond Harbor would, it estimated, cost at least eight millions. It would be very nice to have, with its double track, electric car track, and roads for vehicles and pedestrians, and would no doubt create a goodly traffic between the two towns, and be one of the show works of the continent.
First design and collapse of 29 August 1907
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