Dragon Bridge

The Guardian of the Castle

The bridge, popularly known as Bridge of the Dragon, was built as part of the ring road of Alcalá de Guadaíra, linking A92 (Sevilla- Almería Highway) to A392, Alcalá-Dos Hermanas.

The structure was created by Sevillian engineer José Luis Manzanares, also creator of the popularly known as "Cachorro Bridge" from Seville city. It is 123 metres long, divided into four openings of 18.50 metres (the side ones) and 43 metres the central ones.

The bridge itself is made up by two roads of 7 metres each one with two lanes 3.5 metres wide each, two 2.5 metres sidewalks and a central 3-metre wide central reservation. The structure emulates a dragon that gets out of the Castle hill crossing the River Guadaíra, at the foot of one of the largest Almohad fortresses in Europe. This way, the dragon is "the Guardian of the Castle" and the town defender, and also the one in charge to receive its visitors.

The bridge is inspired directly in the Barcelona architect Antonio Gaudi works and in particular in the dragon that decorates one of the fountains in Güell Park of Barcelona. They both share between themselves and also with other Gaudi works, the use of pieces of glazed tiles to decorate surfaces according the trencadís (or Pique assiette) technique.

The bridge design was chosen by popular voting of Alcalá's people among several designs.