Sunshine Skyway bridge, Florida

The Sunshine Skyway bridge is a well known landmark to Floridians. It is a man- made marvel of human ingenuity and architecture. Aside from its obvious function of connecting two land areas together, people have been soaking up its beauty for years now.The bridge is open 24hrs a day, and there is a nominal toll charge to cross it.The Sunshine Skyway bridge was originally built in the 1950's, but because of a disasterous partial collapse, on May 9th, 1980, due to a freighter collision, it was rebuilt in the late 1980's.The new Sunshine Skyway bridge now has safe guards in the form of a designed protection system to assure that no tanker accidents should happen again.

Stretching across Tampa Bay , the main span is touted at 1200 ft long, with a 193 ft vertical clearance for large vessels to safely pass under it . The Sunshine Skyway is a cable bridge made from concrete and huge cables. Approximately 20,000 vehicles pass over its roadways daily.

Fishing and boating along the routes of the Sunshine Skyway bridge are a regular and familiar sight most days.