Beijing's coolest fly-overs?

[bianfuxia]

Hey friends,

I have this thing for fly-overs. Big sweeping highway bridges interweaving in chaotic yet often beautiful ways.

What are some of your favourites (assuming there is anyone who shares this interest)?

I have only a week left in this fair town - for a while at least - and have been meaning for ages to go and check some fly-over junctions out.

Grateful for any suggestions. I've always liked the big one over at Xizhimen and the point where the airport express way intersects the northeast 4th ring. Any other favourites?

Thanks!

[roddy]

Great thread!

For my money, coming north along the east second ring past all the neon of Dongzhimen then swinging round west to come past Yonghegong level with the roofs of the Lama Temple has to win. Not strictly a flyover is one of the tunnels you go through on Xizhimenwai - this used to be one of my favorites as there were blue neon tubes lining the tunnels and there was a bit of a Tron effect going on. Neither of those are particularly complex, but they're pretty.

I suspect the west side of the second ring might be worth a look if all the buildings at Financial Street are light up, but haven't seen that myself.

For best effect of course, it needs to be late at night, you need to be slightly drunk and very well-fed, all the neon needs to be on, you need to be weaving in between fleets of blue Liberation trucks, and the taxi driver needs to be telling you you really shouldn't be sticking your head out the window like that. Late-night taxi meet, anyone?

[gougou]

Deliberately ignoring the topic, I must say that the most impressive flyover I've ever seen is in Shanghai, where they have four or five roads intersecting at different heights on one immense pillar.

In Beijing, I quite like the part that takes you east from Dongzhimen.

[Rincewind]

Ditto Gougou. I was in Shanghai two weeks ago and they have some really neat fly overs. I especially liked Nanpu bridge. It has a big cork screw style fly over leading to the start of the bridge. I went round clockwise by two full revolutions before exiting. For photo see here: http://www.hel2.fi/kkansl/jugendsali/Nayttelyt/Kaunis%20Kiina/3_en.html

[imron]

Not in China, but check out these flyovers.

[gato]

The Xizhimen Overpass （西直门立交桥）. Definitely not for the novice driver.