The Forth Bridge is the Scottish cantilever railway bridge opened in 1890 across the Firth of Forth.
The bridge links South Queensferry, near Edinburgh, with North Queensferry in Fife, carrying the Edinburgh–Aberdeen railway over the estuary. It officially opened on 4 March 1890, after construction began in 1882. The project was promoted by the North British Railway to eliminate the need for a ferry crossing and create a direct route through Scotland.
Engineers Sir John Fowler and Sir Benjamin Baker designed the bridge as three enormous steel cantilever towers, connected by approach spans and suspended central girders. When completed, its two main spans were the longest single cantilever spans in the world. The structure required around 54,000 tonnes of steel and millions of rivets, making it one of the great engineering achievements of the Victorian era.
The Forth Bridge is sometimes called the Forth Rail Bridge, especially to distinguish it from the newer Forth Road Bridge and Queensferry Crossing. It is not a suspension bridge like the Clifton Suspension Bridge, and it should not be confused with the Tay Bridge, another Scottish railway crossing associated with the 1879 Tay Bridge disaster. UNESCO listed the Forth Bridge as a World Heritage Site in 2015.