It was August 1966 when it was inaugurated under the watchful eyes of thousands of people. This Thursday, 6 August 2026, the 25 April Bridge marks its 60th anniversary.
Formerly known as the Salazar Bridge, the first crossing over the Tagus was built in less than four years, during the Estado Novo regime, at a final cost of 4.49 million contos (old Portuguese currency), the equivalent of around 22.39 million euros.
Regarded as “the biggest public project” ever carried out in Portugal up to that time, the construction involved around 3,000 workers every day, 14 civil engineering companies, 11 of them Portuguese, and tens of thousands of tonnes of steel, making this infrastructure an international benchmark in engineering.
The bridge, suspended by steel cables and supported by orange-coloured metal towers inspired by the Golden Gate in San Francisco, currently has two decks. The structure was designed to carry rail traffic as well, which only began operating around thirty years after the inauguration.
The bridge linking Lisbon and Almada stands out for its main span of 1,013 metres, the largest in Europe for a crossing that combines road and rail traffic.
The distance between anchorages is more than two kilometres and the main towers rise 196 metres above water level, while the south pier reaches a depth of around 80 metres below the riverbed.
Thousands displaced
Despite the advantages for mobility between the two banks of the Tagus, the bridge’s construction was marked by the relocation of thousands of residents from the Alcântara Valley, evicted to make way for the access roads and pillars.
At the time, the architect Nuno Teotónio Pereira criticised the Salazar regime for the conditions under which the evictions and rehousing took place, which he considered rushed and poorly planned.
Portugal’s busiest crossing
Over the past six decades, traffic on the bridge has grown steadily, reaching a record in 2005 with more than 57 million vehicles and a daily average of 156,000, driven by the demographic expansion of the Setúbal Peninsula.
During the pandemic, in 2020 and 2021, the lowest figures were recorded, with a daily average of 115,000 and 124,000 vehicles respectively, according to data from the National Statistics Institute (INE).
Despite the opening of the Vasco da Gama Bridge in 1998, linking Alcochete and Lisbon, the 25 April Bridge remains the most used crossing over the Tagus, with more than twice the traffic.
In Porto, the Freixo Bridge and the Arrábida Bridge carry very heavy traffic in the metropolitan area, but fall short of the 25 April Bridge in terms of daily traffic volumes.
Currently, according to Infraestruturas de Portugal (IP), the 25 April Bridge is used daily by around 150,000 vehicles and 174 trains, serving more than 100 million users a year.
Tolls fuel controversy
Since it opened in 1966, the crossing has been subject to tolls. The charge for a class 1 vehicle has gone from 10 escudos to the current 2.25 euros, although between 1996 and 2010 toll collection was suspended during the month of August.
The suspension stemmed from the 1994 “buzinão” car-horn protest against the 50% increase in tolls and from the concession agreement with Lusoponte, which has operated the infrastructure since 1996.
Earlier this year, a new “buzinão”, organised by the bridge users’ association, once again challenged the 2.29% increase in tolls and demanded that charges be scrapped.
Maintenance costs around 1.6 million euros a year
The maintenance and inspection of the 25 April Bridge cost Infraestruturas de Portugal (IP) an average of around 1.6 million euros a year. The company says the structure is subject to constant inspection and maintenance by an internal team exclusively dedicated to these tasks.
According to IP, this investment covers inspections, maintenance, materials, equipment, studies, designs and consulting services. The company also has the support of ISQ (the Institute of Welding and Quality) and LNEC (the National Civil Engineering Laboratory) in structural monitoring of the bridge, as well as that of US-based Parsons, the original designer of the infrastructure, which continues to track the structure’s behaviour and the main interventions carried out.
The most recent rehabilitation and structural reinforcement contract was completed in March 2024. Infraestruturas de Portugal is now preparing the project for repainting the entire bridge to “ensure the preservation and durability of the infrastructure”.
In September 2025, Bruno Mascarenhas, Chega’s councillor in Lisbon, told the Lisbon Municipal Assembly that the bridge “is in a worrying condition in terms of its support structure”.
When questioned by the Lusa news agency, Infraestruturas de Portugal insisted that inspection, monitoring and maintenance activities “ensure that the 25 April Bridge continues to meet the highest standards of safety, reliability and performance”.
The 60th anniversary of the 25 April Bridge was marked by a show featuring 500 drones over the river Tagus:
New crossings
Plans currently foresee the construction of a new road-and-rail crossing between Chelas and Barreiro, as well as a road link between Algés and Trafaria.
As for the third crossing over the Tagus, in a written reply sent to the Lusa agency, Infraestruturas de Portugal (IP) says it is “developing, at the Government’s request, the technical, economic and environmental studies needed to deliver the project for the new road-and-rail crossing”. The Environmental Impact Study is due to be submitted to the Portuguese Environment Agency (APA) in the third quarter of this year, that is by September.
IP adds that the road link between Algés and Trafaria has been identified by the Government as a “priority project”, with the tender for the Preliminary Study and Environmental Impact Study expected to be launched by the end of the year.
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