At first glance, the cable-stayed bridge may look like just a variant of the

suspension bridge, but don't let their similar towers and hanging
roadways fool you. Cable-stayed bridges differ from their suspension
predecessors in that they don't require anchorages, nor do they need
two towers. Instead, the cables run from the roadway up to a single
tower that alone bears the weight.

The tower of a cable-stayed bridge is responsible for absorbing and

dealing with compressional forces. The cables attach to the roadway in
various ways. For example, in a radial pattern, cables extend from
several points on the road to a single point at the tower, like numerous
fishing lines attached to a single pole. In a parallel pattern, the cables
attach to both the roadway and the tower at several separate points.

Engineers constructed the first cable-stayed bridges in Europe following

the close of World War II, but the basic design dates back to the 16th
century and Croatian inventor Faust Vrancic. A contemporary
of astronomers Tycho Brache and Johannes Kepler, Vrancic produced
the first known sketch of a cable-stayed bridge in his book "Machinae
Novae."

Today, cable-stayed bridges are a popular choice as they offer all the
advantages of a suspension bridge but at a lesser cost for spans of 500
to 2,800 feet (152 to 853 meters). They require less steel cable, are
faster to build and incorporate more precast concrete sections.

Not all bridges requires great hunks of steel and concrete though.
Sometimes a tree root or two will do the trick.

Cable-stayed bridge is a bridge similar to suspended bridge in that it has

towers and a deck that is held by cables, but its cables hold the deck by
connecting it directly to the towers instead via suspender cables. It
usually carries pedestrians, bicycles, automobiles, trucks, and light rail. It
is used in places where spans need to be longer than cantilever
bridgecan achieve (because of its weight), but the span is short enough
so a suspension bridge is not practical there economically.
Venetian inventor Fausto Veranzio was the first to design cable stayed
bridges (he was also the first to design modern suspended bridge). He
published his works in 1595 in his book “Machinae Novae”. First built
cable-stayed bridges appeared in the 19th century and many
early suspension bridges were cable-stayed like footbridge Dryburgh
Abbey Bridge, James Dredge's Victoria Bridge, in Bath, England (Built in
1836), Albert Bridge (built in 1872) and Brooklyn Bridge (1883). Other
early cable-stayed bridges in the United States were Barton Creek
Bridge between Huckabay, Texas and Gordon, Texas (built in 1889),
bridge over Bluff Dale, Texas, (built in 1890a and it still largely stands).
Constraction of this type of bridge continued into the 20th century when
where built “Cassagnes bridge” (designed by A. Gisclard), le Coq's
bridge at Lézardrieux in Brittany, France (designed by G. Leinekugel and
built in 1924), and aqueduct at Tempul in 1926. Concrete-decked cable-
stayed bridge over the Donzère-Mondragon canal at Pierrelatte was
designed by Albert Caquot in 1952 and was one of the first the modern
cable-stayed bridges but no other that came after, looked up to it.
Strömsund Bridge designed by Franz Dischinger in 1955 had more
influence on the design of the later bridges and is more often mentioned
as the first modern. Fabrizio de Miranda, Riccardo Morandi and Fritz
Leonhardt are the design pioneers of the modern cable-stayed bridge
and their designs had very few stay cables which was modern but
resulted in higher erection costs. Later designs have much more cables
which is more economic in the terms of building.
A cable-stayed bridge can be built in different variations:

 “A side-spar cable-stayed bridge” has only one tower and is

supported only on one side. One bridge built on this principle is
bridge in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada and is made to carry
pedestrians. Other is Jerusalem Chords Bridge which is also
made to be curved which this design allows for.
  “Cantilever-spar cable-stayed bridge” has a single cantilever
spar on one side of the span. Its spar is made to resist the
bending caused by the cables because cable forces of this
bridge are not balanced by opposing cables and bridge applies
large overturning force on its foundation. Puente de la Mujer
(2001), Sundial Bridge (2004) and Chords Bridge (2008), all in
Spain, are bridges of this type.
 “Multiple-span cable-stayed bridge” is a cable-stayed bridge
with more than 3 spans. It is a more complex bridge because the
loads from the main spans are not anchored back near the end
abutments. This also makes structure less stiff so additional
design solutions (like “cross-bracing” stays and stiff multi-legged
frame towers) have to be applied.
 “Extradosed bridge” has stiffer and stronger deck and its cables
are connected to the deck further from the towers which are also
lower than those of standard cable-stayed bridges.
 “Cable-stayed cradle-system Bridge” is one of the newest
variants. It has so called “cradle system” which carries the
strands within the stays from bridge deck to bridge deck. These
cables are continuous which means that this bridge has no
anchorages in the pylons and its cables can be removed,
inspected and replaced individually.

(first video clip: This is my 2015 Capstone Design Project at the University of Ottawa,
Canada. The Objective of the Project was to Design a Light Rail Train Bridge between
Ottawa, Ontario and Gatineau, Quebec. Bridge type selected was a Harp system Cable-
Stayed Bridge made of reinforced concrete. Located at 45°24'45.71"N 75°43'33.38"W.
Software used: Tekla Structures, Lumion, Sketchup, AutoCAD, Unity.)