I don't think you appreciate quite what an outlier that bridge is, and plugging the cost into an inflation calculator then comparing it the Bay Bridge or the ne

I don't think you appreciate quite what an outlier that bridge is, and plugging the cost into an inflation calculator then comparing it the Bay Bridge or the new Queensferry Crossing isn't a good comparison either. It's maybe better to compare to an example from around that time, and as it happens there's actually a really good and relevant one we can use. The Forth Bridge was designed and constructed shortly after a slightly longer rail bridge over the river Tay had famously collapsed - a bridge which was constructed for 0.35 million GBP. So we're talking nearly 10x the cost for a bridge that is actually just a little bit shorter. Veering slightly offtopic now, but I don't know we can confidently say it yielded a "cheaper" result too - maintenance over the years has been pretty expensive, since the bridge needed to be constantly coated with special paint to prevent corrosion. This has found its way into Scots language as a popular simile for a neverending task: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/like_painting_the_Forth_Bridge https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/like_painting_the_Forth_Bridg...