Japan's only movable bridge! Suehiro Bridge in Yokkaichi, Mie Pref, Japan

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The Suehiro Bridge (Suehiro-kyo-ryo) is a swing-open movable bridge over the Chitose Canal in Yokkaichi, Mie Prefecture. It is valuable in the history of bridge technology and was the first movable bridge to be designated an Important Cultural Property. It is a railway bridge, with an outer sidetrack (JR Kansai Main Line Yokkaichi Station - Yokkaichi Port) running over the bridge. The west bank is Suehiro-cho, Yokkaichi City, which was the Yokkaichi No. 1 landfill site, and the east bank is Chitose-cho, which was the No. 2 landfill site.
Completed in December 1931, this is the only active jumping-opening movable railway bridge in Japan, consisting of five sets of girders, one set of concrete girders and four sets of steel girders. The girders of the central span are lifted from a fulcrum on the Yokkaichi Station side (west side) by cables passed over the tops of the gantry steel pillars erected on the piers. The cable is operated from a machine room on the Yokkaichi Station side, and is hoisted up by a winch to move the girders. On weekdays, the bridge is normally raised at an angle of about 80 degrees to allow ships to navigate, but when trains are running, the girders are lowered to allow passage. On weekends, on the other hand, the bridge is always lowered and only raised when ships are passing. It takes approximately 1 minute 30 seconds to raise the bridge and 2 minutes to lower it.
Previously, the bridge was always lowered and only raised when a ship passed, but since April 1999 it has been raised constantly on weekdays and lowered only when a train passes. The hoisting motor and wires were replaced in November 2000. The last metre or so of the descent was operated manually, but this was fully automated at the time of the replacement. During the construction of Chubu International Airport, a record of 12 times a day it was opened and closed for the transport of earth and sand.
The trains that pass through are goods trains carrying cement and earth and sand from Higashi Fujiwara on the Sangi Railway Sangi Line to Taiheiyo Cement at Yokkaichi Port via Tomita and Yokkaichi on the JR Kansai Main Line, and as of 2008 there were five round trips a day. The line is managed by Japan Freight Railway (JR Freight), but this line is handled within Yokkaichi Station and the actual operation is outsourced to an affiliate company, Nagoya Rinkai Railway. It has become famous for the sight of staff rushing to the station from Yokkaichi Station on bicycles at the appointed time.
The Rinko Bridge, which is also a swing-open movable bridge (for cars and pedestrians), is located 200 metres to the south. Contrary to the railway bridge, this bridge is normally lowered and raised when ships pass through, and it opens and closes with the Yokkaichi Port side as a fulcrum, the opposite of the railway bridge. For this reason, the two movable bridges can be seen in an unusual scene when ships are passing through, with the two bridges springing up side by side.
In December 1998, the bridge was designated a National Important Cultural Property as a Heritage of Modernisation building. In February 2009, it was also recognised as a Heritage of Industrial Modernisation by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
On 24 July 2015, it was recognised as Mechanical Heritage No. 70 by the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers.
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