Reminds me of the Log Flumes at six flags.

Six years of construction and only 500million euros. How is that the federal goverment (of US) was spending 2 billion! a day after katrina in Lousiana? I just don't get it...

This Water Bridge looks way cool.
However, I'm at a loss to come up with some reason they might need such a thing.

Are you sure this is real, Alex?

Transportation architecture like this has been around since the Romans.

Here's another article about the bridge:

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,990878,00.html

It seems that they wanted to link together two shipping canals.

Water bridges are nothing new, as a previous commenter noted. There used to be one in Washington, DC, carrying the C&O canal over the Potomac River. It was the Aqueduct Bridge, and it once stood where today's Key Bridge stands. You can still see the piers in the water. (http://www.victoriansecrets.net/aqueduct.html and http://www.hrl.lib.state.va.us/Handley/Archives/Aqueduct Bridge 1352.htm)

I come from a family of shipmen. I'm born and raised on Dutch, German and Belgian rivers and canals. I haven't been on the Magdeburg aquaduct, but I have on some others. It's a funny experience to be on a ship above a road with cars and all.

There are also elevators to take ships to a canal at a higher level:

"Strépy-Thieu, is of course well-known for its ship elevator, the largest in the world. Using the elevator, a ship can take the difference in level of 73 metres, between the basin of the Scheldt and the basin of the Meuse, in only seven minutes."

http://services-techniques.met.wallonie.be/en/waterways/strepythieu_boat_lift/

http://www.rars.dk/ferie2004/ascenseur.html

http://users.skynet.be/leclercq/lr6.htm

You mean a picture with a REAL caption?? AMAZING.

... "It seems that they wanted to link together two shipping canals."

I gathered that from the first article, but what I don't understand is why they couldn't just dig a 1-km-long ditch between the two canals, instead of building a (presumably much more difficult and expensive) "water bridge."

"... why they couldn't just dig a 1-km-long ditch between the two canals ..."

Since the aquaduct (water bridge) crosses the river Elbe, I can think of two reasons.

A) The canals connected are at a higher level than the river Elbe.

B) The canal-system is made separate from the river Elbe to ensure a constant water mark (water height) and a reliable transport route.
As you can read on http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,990878,00.html : "The water bridge will enable river barges to avoid a lengthy and sometimes unreliable passage along the Elbe. Shipping can often come to a halt on the stretch if the river’s water mark falls to unacceptably low levels."

In Germany the rivers have their source in the mountains and they stream through The Netherlands to the sea. When the snow in the mountains is melting the water can get very high. And the water can get very low too.

If I remember right, the walls along the river Rhine in the city of Köln (Cologne) are about 40 feet high. I've seen the water above them, flooding the city.

" ...In Germany the rivers have their source in the mountains and they stream through The Netherlands to the sea."

Well, some of them do, but I believe the Elbe and the other rivers mentioned in this news story run north to the Baltic Sea.

Maybe they just wanted to show off.

"Well, some of them do, but I believe the Elbe and the other rivers mentioned in this news story run north to the Baltic Sea."

I've never been good at topography. Anyway, regardless where the Elbe runs to, it has the problem the water sometimes gets to low for ships. So ...

ITS PREATY COOL I GESS

Bill is right, water bridges for canals have been around since Roman times and the British used several for the Navigations, a system of canals for transport still used today.

having said that, this one looks a damn site bigger and wider than those. What sort of cumec capacity doe sit have? Anyone know?

Here's a picture explaining why they built it: