1.
Seine
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The Seine is a 777-kilometre-long river and an important commercial waterway within the Paris Basin in the north of France. It rises at Source-Seine,30 kilometres northwest of Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plateau, flowing through Paris and it is navigable by ocean-going vessels as far as Rouen,120 kilometres from the sea. There are 37 bridges within Paris and dozens more spanning the river outside the city, examples in Paris include the Pont Alexandre III and Pont Neuf, the latter of which dates back to 1607. Outside the city, examples include the Pont de Normandie, one of the longest cable-stayed bridges in the world, the Seine rises in the commune of Source-Seine, about 30 kilometres northwest of Dijon. The source has been owned by the city of Paris since 1864, a number of closely associated small ditches or depressions provide the source waters, with an artificial grotto laid out to highlight and contain a deemed main source. The grotto includes a statue of a nymph, on the same site are the buried remains of a Gallo-Roman temple. Small statues of the dea Sequana Seine goddess and other ex voti found at the place are now exhibited in the Dijon archeological museum. The Seine is dredged and oceangoing vessels can dock at Rouen,120 kilometres from the sea, commercial riverboats can use the river from Bar-sur-Seine,560 kilometres to its mouth. At Paris, there are 37 bridges, the river is only 24 metres above sea level 446 kilometres from its mouth, making it slow flowing and thus easily navigable. The Seine Maritime,105.7 kilometres from the English Channel at Le Havre to Rouen, is the portion of the Seine used by ocean-going craft. The tidal section of the Seine Maritime is followed by a section with four large multiple locks until the mouth of the Oise at Conflans-Sainte-Honorine. Multiple locks at Bougival / Chatou and at Suresnes lift the vessels to the level of the river in Paris, upstream from Paris seven locks ensure navigation to Saint Mammès, where the Loing mouth is situated. Through an eighth lock the river Yonne is reached at Montereau-Fault-Yonne, from the mouth of the Yonne, larger ships can continue upstream to Nogent-sur-Seine. From there on, the river is only by small craft. All navigation ends abruptly at Marcilly-sur-Seine, where the ancient Canal de la Haute-Seine used to allow vessels to continue all the way to Troyes and this canal has been abandoned for many years. The average depth of the Seine today at Paris is about 9.5 metres. Until locks were installed to raise the level in the 1800s, the river was much shallower within the city most of the time, today the depth is tightly controlled and the entire width of the river between the built-up banks on either side is normally filled with water. The average flow of the river is low, only a few cubic metres per second
2.
Le Havre
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Le Havre is an urban French commune and city in the Seine-Maritime department in the Normandy region of northwestern France. It is situated on the bank of the estuary of the river Seine on the Channel southwest of the Pays de Caux. Modern Le Havre remains deeply influenced by its employment and maritime traditions and its port is the second largest in France, after that of Marseille, for total traffic, and the largest French container port. The name Le Havre means the harbour or the port and its inhabitants are known as Havrais or Havraises. Administratively the commune is located in the Normandy region and, with Dieppe, is one of the two sub-prefectures of the Seine-Maritime department, Le Havre is the capital of the canton and since 1974 has been the see of the diocese of Le Havre. Le Havre is the most populous commune of Upper Normandy, although the population of the greater Le Havre conurbation is smaller than that of Rouen. It is also the second largest subprefecture in France, the city and port were founded by the King Francis I of France in 1517. Economic development in the Early modern period was hampered by wars, conflicts with the English, epidemics. It was from the end of the 18th century that Le Havre started growing, after the 1944 bombings the firm of Auguste Perret began to rebuild the city in concrete. Changes in years 1990–2000 were numerous, the right won the municipal elections and committed the city to the path of reconversion, seeking to develop the service sector and new industries. The Port 2000 project increased the capacity to compete with ports of northern Europe, transformed the southern districts of the city. In 2005 UNESCO inscribed the city of Le Havre as a World Heritage Site. The André Malraux Modern Art Museum is the second of France for the number of impressionist paintings, the city has been awarded two flowers by the National Council of Towns and Villages in Bloom in the Competition of cities and villages in Bloom. Le Havre is a major French city located some 50 kilometres west of Rouen on the shore of the English Channel, numerous roads link to Le Havre with the main access roads being the A29 autoroute from Amiens and the A13 autoroute from Paris linking to the A131 autoroute. Administratively, Le Havre is a commune in the Haute-Normandie region in the west of the department of Seine-Maritime, the urban area of Le Havre corresponds roughly to the territory of the Agglomeration community of Le Havre which includes 17 communes and 250,000 people. It occupies the tip of the natural region of Pays de Caux where it is the largest city. Le Havre is sandwiched between the coast of the Channel from south-west to north-west and the estuary of the Seine to the south, Le Havre belongs to the MLG community Paris Basin which was formed in the Mesozoic period. The Paris Basin consists of sedimentary rocks, the commune of Le Havre consists of two areas separated by a natural cliff edge, one part in the lower part of the town to the south including the harbour, the city centre and the suburbs
3.
Honfleur
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Honfleur is a commune in the Calvados department in northwestern France. It is located on the bank of the estuary of the Seine across from le Havre. The Sainte-Catherine church, which has a bell tower separate from the building, is the largest church made out of wood in France. The first written record of Honfleur is a reference by Richard III, Duke of Normandy, by the middle of the 12th century, the city represented a significant transit point for goods from Rouen to England. The towns defences were strengthened by Charles V in order to protect the estuary of the Seine from attacks from the English and this was supported by the nearby port of Harfleur. However, Honfleur was taken and occupied by the English in 1357, when under French control, raiding parties often set out from the port to ransack the English coasts, including partially destroying the town of Sandwich, in Kent, England, in the 1450s. At the end of the Hundred Years War, Honfleur benefited from the boom in maritime trade until the end of the 18th century, trade was disturbed during the wars of religion in the 16th century. The port saw the departure of a number of explorers, in particular in 1503 of Binot Paulmierde Gonneville to the coasts of Brazil, in 1506, local man Jean Denis departed for Newfoundland island and the mouth of the Saint Lawrence. An expedition in 1608, organised by Samuel de Champlain, founded the city of Quebec in modern-day Canada, after 1608, Honfleur thrived on trade with Canada, the West Indies, the African coasts and the Azores. As a result, the town one of the five principal ports for the slave trade in France. During this time the growth of the town saw the demolition of its fortifications on the orders of Colbert. The wars of the French revolution and the First Empire, and in particular the continental blockade and it only partially recovered during the 19th century with the trading of wood from northern Europe. Trade was however limited by the silting up of the entrance to the port, the port however still functions today. Mentioned as Hunefleth in 1025, Hunefloth around 1062, Honneflo in 1198, Honflue in 1246, Honnefleu, traditional pronunciation, with the h strongly expirated, like in loch. It could come from a word of Old Norse origin flóð, compare Old English flōd, such a connection between two close place-names can be noted regularly in the Norman toponymy. They are, in any case, close places, Crémanfleur / Crémanville, Barfleur / Barbeville, the -ville element is almost always combined with a personal name. The similarity with the name of Bay of Húnaflói in Iceland may be coincidence, Honfleur is in the Norman département of Calvados, located on the southern bank of the estuary of the Seine, across from le Havre and very close to the exit of the Pont de Normandie. The town is at the extremity of the 40 km coastline called the Côte Fleurie
4.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
5.
Cable-stayed bridge
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A cable-stayed bridge has one or more towers, from which cables support the bridge deck. A distinctive feature are the cables run directly from the tower to the deck. The cable-stayed bridge is optimal for spans longer than cantilever bridges and this is the range where cantilever bridges would rapidly grow heavier if the span were lengthened, while suspension bridge cabling would not be more economical if the span were shortened. Cable-stayed bridges have been known since the 16th century and used widely since the 19th, early examples often combined features from both the cable-stayed and suspension designs, including the famous Brooklyn Bridge. The design fell from favor through the 20th century as larger gaps were bridged using pure suspension designs, Cable-stayed bridges date back to 1595, where designs were found in Machinae Novae, a book by Venetian inventor Fausto Veranzio. Their designers found that the combination of technologies created a stiffer bridge, john A. Roebling took particular advantage of this to limit deformations due to railway loads in the Niagara Falls Suspension Bridge. Eduardo Torroja designed an aqueduct at Tempul in 1926. Albert Caquots 1952 concrete-decked cable-stayed bridge over the Donzère-Mondragon canal at Pierrelatte is one of the first of the modern type, the steel-decked Strömsund Bridge designed by Franz Dischinger is, therefore, more often cited as the first modern cable-stayed bridge. Other key pioneers included Fabrizio de Miranda, Riccardo Morandi, early bridges from this period used very few stay cables, as in the Theodor Heuss Bridge. However, this involves substantial erection costs, and more modern structures tend to use many more cables to ensure greater economy, Cable-stayed bridges may appear to be similar to suspension bridges, but in fact, they are quite different in principle and in their construction. In suspension bridges, large main cables hang between the towers and are anchored at each end to the ground and this can be difficult to implement when ground conditions are poor. The main cables, which are free to move on bearings in the towers, before the deck is installed, the cables are under tension from their own weight. Along the main cables smaller cables or rods connect to the bridge deck, as this is done, the tension in the cables increases, as it does with the live load of traffic crossing the bridge. The tension on the cables is transferred to the ground at the anchorages. Difference between types of bridges In the cable-stayed bridge, the towers are the primary load-bearing structures which transmit the loads to the ground. A cantilever approach is used to support the bridge deck near the towers. The mono design uses a cable from its towers and is one of the lesser-used examples of the class. In the harp or parallel design, the cables are nearly parallel so that the height of their attachment to the tower is proportional to the distance from the tower to their mounting on the deck
6.
Viaduct
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A viaduct is a bridge composed of several small spans for crossing a valley, dry or wetland, or forming a flyover. The term viaduct is derived from the Latin via for road and ducere, the ancient Romans did not use the term, it is a modern derivation from an analogy with aqueduct. Like the Roman aqueducts, many early viaducts comprised a series of arches of equal length. Viaducts may span land, water or both, a viaduct is a bridge composed of several small spans for crossing a valley or a gorge. The term is conventional for a flyover as opposed to a flying junction or a rail bridge which crosses one feature. In Romance languages, the word refers to a bridge which spans only land. A bridge spanning water is called ponte, the longest viaduct in antiquity may have been the Pont Serme which crossed wide marshes in southern France. Viaducts are commonly used in cities that are railroad centers, such as Chicago, Atlanta, Birmingham, London. These viaducts cross the railroad yards that are needed for freight trains there. These viaducts keep highway and city street traffic from having to be interrupted by the train traffic. Likewise, some viaducts carry railroads over large valleys, or they carry railroads over cities with many cross-streets, many viaducts over land connect points of similar height in a landscape, usually by bridging a river valley or other eroded opening in an otherwise flat area. Often such valleys had roads descending either side that become inadequate for the traffic load, such bridges also lend themselves for use by rail traffic, which requires straighter and flatter routes. Some viaducts have more than one deck, such that one deck has vehicular traffic, others were built to span settled areas, crossing over roads beneath—the reason for many viaducts in London. Viaducts over water use of islands or successive arches. The Millau Viaduct is a cable-stayed road-bridge that spans the valley of the River Tarn near Millau in southern France and it was formally dedicated on 14 December 2004 and opened to traffic two days later. The viaduct Danyang–Kunshan Grand Bridge in China is the longest bridge in the according to Guinness World Records as of 2011. Where a viaduct is built across land rather than water, the space below the arches may be used for such as car parking, vehicle repairs, light industry, bars. In the United Kingdom, many lines in urban areas have been constructed on viaducts
7.
Normandy
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Normandy is one of the regions of France, roughly corresponding to the historical Duchy of Normandy. Administratively, Normandy is divided into five departments, Calvados, Eure, Manche, Orne and it covers 30,627 km², forming roughly 5% of the territory of France. Its population of 3.37 million accounts for around 5% of the population of France, Normans is the name given to the inhabitants of Normandy, and the region is the homeland of the Norman language. The historical region of Normandy comprised the region of Normandy, as well as small areas now part of the départements, or departments of Mayenne. For a century and a following the Norman conquest of England in 1066, Normandy and England were linked by Norman. Archaeological finds, such as paintings, prove that humans were present in the region in prehistoric times. Celts invaded Normandy in successive waves from the 4th to the 3rd century BC, when Julius Caesar invaded Gaul, there were nine different Celtic tribes living in Normandy. The Romanisation of Normandy was achieved by the methods, Roman roads. Classicists have knowledge of many Gallo-Roman villas in Normandy, in the late 3rd century, barbarian raids devastated Normandy. Coastal settlements were raided by Saxon pirates, Christianity also began to enter the area during this period. In 406, Germanic tribes began invading from the east, while the Saxons subjugated the Norman coast, the Roman Emperor withdrew from most of Normandy. As early as 487, the area between the River Somme and the River Loire came under the control of the Frankish lord Clovis, the Vikings started to raid the Seine Valley during the middle of the 9th century. As early as 841, a Viking fleet appeared at the mouth of the Seine, after attacking and destroying monasteries, including one at Jumièges, they took advantage of the power vacuum created by the disintegration of Charlemagnes empire to take northern France. The fiefdom of Normandy was created for the Norwegian Viking leader Hrólfr Ragnvaldsson, Rollo had besieged Paris but in 911 entered vassalage to the king of the West Franks, Charles the Simple, through the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte. In exchange for his homage and fealty, Rollo legally gained the territory which he, the name Normandy reflects Rollos Viking origins. The descendants of Rollo and his followers adopted the local Gallo-Romance language and they became the Normans – a Norman-speaking mixture of Saxons and indigenous Franks and Celts. Besides the Norman conquest of England and the subsequent conquests of Wales and Ireland, Norman families, such as that of Tancred of Hauteville, Rainulf Drengot and Guimond de Moulins played important parts in the Norman conquest of southern Italy and Crusades. They also carved out a place for themselves and their descendants in the Crusader states of Asia Minor, the 14th century Norman explorer Jean de Béthencourt established a kingdom in the Canary Islands
8.
Japan
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Japan is a sovereign island nation in Eastern Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies off the eastern coast of the Asia Mainland and stretches from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea, the kanji that make up Japans name mean sun origin. 日 can be read as ni and means sun while 本 can be read as hon, or pon, Japan is often referred to by the famous epithet Land of the Rising Sun in reference to its Japanese name. Japan is an archipelago consisting of about 6,852 islands. The four largest are Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu and Shikoku, the country is divided into 47 prefectures in eight regions. Hokkaido being the northernmost prefecture and Okinawa being the southernmost one, the population of 127 million is the worlds tenth largest. Japanese people make up 98. 5% of Japans total population, approximately 9.1 million people live in the city of Tokyo, the capital of Japan. Archaeological research indicates that Japan was inhabited as early as the Upper Paleolithic period, the first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD. Influence from other regions, mainly China, followed by periods of isolation, from the 12th century until 1868, Japan was ruled by successive feudal military shoguns who ruled in the name of the Emperor. Japan entered into a period of isolation in the early 17th century. The Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan is a member of the UN, the OECD, the G7, the G8, the country has the worlds third-largest economy by nominal GDP and the worlds fourth-largest economy by purchasing power parity. It is also the worlds fourth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer, although Japan has officially renounced its right to declare war, it maintains a modern military with the worlds eighth-largest military budget, used for self-defense and peacekeeping roles. Japan is a country with a very high standard of living. Its population enjoys the highest life expectancy and the third lowest infant mortality rate in the world, in ancient China, Japan was called Wo 倭. It was mentioned in the third century Chinese historical text Records of the Three Kingdoms in the section for the Wei kingdom, Wa became disliked because it has the connotation of the character 矮, meaning dwarf. The 倭 kanji has been replaced with the homophone Wa, meaning harmony, the Japanese word for Japan is 日本, which is pronounced Nippon or Nihon and literally means the origin of the sun. The earliest record of the name Nihon appears in the Chinese historical records of the Tang dynasty, at the start of the seventh century, a delegation from Japan introduced their country as Nihon
9.
Suspension bridge
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A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders. The first modern examples of type of bridge were built in the early 19th century. Simple suspension bridges, which lack vertical suspenders, have a history in many mountainous parts of the world. This type of bridge has cables suspended between towers, plus vertical suspender cables carry the weight of the deck below, upon which traffic crosses. This arrangement allows the deck to be level or to arc upward for additional clearance, like other suspension bridge types, this type often is constructed without falsework. The suspension cables must be anchored at each end of the bridge, the main cables continue beyond the pillars to deck-level supports, and further continue to connections with anchors in the ground. The roadway is supported by vertical suspender cables or rods, called hangers, in the latter case there will be very little arc in the outboard main cables. The earliest suspension bridges were ropes slung across a chasm, with a deck possibly at the level or hung below the ropes such that the rope had a catenary shape. The Tibetan saint and bridge-builder Thangtong Gyalpo originated the use of chains in his version of simple suspension bridges. In 1433, Gyalpo built eight bridges in eastern Bhutan, the last surviving chain-linked bridge of Gyalpos was the Thangtong Gyalpo Bridge in Duksum en route to Trashi Yangtse, which was finally washed away in 2004. Gyalpos iron chain bridges did not include a deck bridge which is the standard on all modern suspension bridges today. Instead, both the railing and the layer of Gyalpos bridges used wires. The stress points that carried the screed were reinforced by the iron chains, before the use of iron chains it is thought that Gyalpo used ropes from twisted willows or yak skins. He may have also used tightly bound cloth, the first American iron chain suspension bridge was the Jacobs Creek Bridge in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, designed by inventor James Finley. Finleys bridge was the first to all of the necessary components of a modern suspension bridge. Finley patented his design in 1808, and published it in the Philadelphia journal, The Port Folio, in 1810. Early British chain bridges included the Dryburgh Abbey Bridge and 137 m Union Bridge, with rapidly increasing to 176 m with the Menai Bridge. The first chain bridge on the European continent was the Chain Bridge in Nuremberg, the Clifton Suspension Bridge is one of the longest of the parabolic arc chain type
10.
Toll bridge
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A toll bridge is a bridge over which traffic may pass upon payment of a toll, or fee. The practice of collecting tolls on bridges harks back to the days of ferry crossings where people paid a fee to be ferried across stretches of water, as boats became impractical to carry large loads, ferry operators looked for new sources of revenue. Having built a bridge, they hoped to recoup their investment by charging tolls for people, animals, vehicles, and goods to cross it. The original London Bridge across the river Thames opened as a toll bridge, using interest on its capital assets, the trust now owns and runs all seven central London bridges at no cost to taxpayers or users. In the United States, private ownership of toll bridges peaked in the mid-19th century, in some instances, a quasi-governmental authority was formed, and toll revenue bonds were issued to raise funds for construction and/or operation of the facility. Peters and Kramer observed that. little research has been done to quantify the impact of collection on society as a whole. And therefore they published an analysis of the Total Societal Cost associated with toll collection as a means of taxation. TSC is the sum of administrative, compliance, fuel and pollution costs, in 2000 they estimated it to be $56,914,732, or 37. 3% of revenue collected. Nakamura and Kockelman show that tolls are by nature regressive, shifting the burden of taxation disproportionately to the poor and middle classes. Electronic toll collection, branded under names such as EZ-Pass, SunPass, IPass, FasTrak, Treo, GoodToGo, electronic tolling proposals that represented the shadow price of electronic toll collection may have misled decision makers. Consumers have additionally endured an increased administrative burden associated with paying toll bills, additionally, visitors to a region may incur e-toll tag fees imposed by their rental car company. The Paperwork Reduction Act of 1980 identified and attempted to address a problem associated with the government collection of information. Approvals were to be secured by government agencies before promulgating a paper form, website, however, the act did not anticipate and thus address the consumer burden associated with funding infrastructure via electronic toll collection instead of through more traditional forms of taxation. In some instances, tolls have been removed after retirement of the toll revenue bonds issued to raise funds for construction and/or operation of the facility, sometimes citizens revolt against toll plazas, as was the case in Jacksonville, Florida. Tolls were in place on four bridges crossing the St. Johns River and these tolls paid for the respective bridges as well as many other highway projects. As Jacksonville continued to grow, the tolls created bottlenecks on the roadway, in 1988, Jacksonville voters chose to eliminate all the toll booths and replace the revenue with a ½ cent sales tax increase. In 1989, the booths were removed,36 years after the first toll booth went up. In Scotland, the Scottish Parliament purchased the Skye Bridge from its owners in late 2004, in 2004, the German government cancelled a contract with the Toll Collect syndicate after much negative publicity
