Pamban Bridge

Pamban Bridge
Pamban Bridge
	Pamban Bridge
Coordinates	9°16′57.25″N 79°12′5.91″E / 9.2825694°N 79.2016417°E
Carries	Rail
Locale	Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu, India
Owner	Indian Railways
Characteristics
Total length	6,776 feet (2,065 m)
No. of spans	144
Rail characteristics
No. of tracks	1
Track gauge	Broad gauge
History
Construction start	August 1911
Construction end	February 1914
Opened	24 February 1914
Closed	23 December 2022
Replaced by	New Pamban Bridge
Statistics
Daily traffic	Suspended
Location

Pamban Bridge (pronounced: /pɑːmbən/ romanised: pāmban) is a railway bridge that connects the town of Rameswaram on Pamban Island with Mandapam in mainland India. Opened on 24 February 1914, it was India's first sea bridge, and was the longest sea bridge in India until the opening of the Bandra–Worli Sea Link in 2010. The rail bridge is, for the most part, a conventional bridge resting on concrete piers but has a double-leaf bascule section midway, which can be raised to let ships and barges pass through.

The Pamban bridge was the only surface transport link that connected Rameswaram to the mainland India till 1988 when a road bridge was constructed parallel to the railway bridge. In 2020, construction of a new bridge closer to the existing one began which was planned to eventually replace the existing bridge. In December 2022, rail transportation on the bridge was suspended permanently as the bascule section had weakened significantly due to corrosion.