The Infamous Hundred-Million-Dollar Tofu Bridges in Mainland China

The term tofu dreg was first coined by former Chinese premier Zhu Rongji. After inspecting the collapse of flood walls in a southern city in 1998, he angrily criticized the structure as a tofu dreg project when asked about the cause of the failure. Since then, the term tofu dreg construction has frequently appeared in major Chinese media, and has gradually become well known. This video will provide us with a comprehensive look at high quality bridges from ancient and modern times, and compare them with the countless shoddy, dangerous, and collapsing tofu dreg structures under the CCP's rule. Let's take a look at these bridges first. Let's start with a bridge built during the Sui dynasty, the Zhaozhou Bridge. Designed and constructed by the famous craftsman Li Chun, it is approximately 1,400 years old. The Zhongshan Iron Bridge over the Yellow River in Lanzhou was built in 1909 by the German Tailai Company. The steel and cement were both imported from Germany, and it is still in use 110 years later. The warranty period of the bridge was 80 years. After the warranty of the Iron Bridge expired in 1989, the German parties wrote to the Lanzhou municipal government to inquire about the status of the bridge, and noted that the contract had expired. The Luoyang Bridge, formerly known as Wanyan Bridge, was overseen by Kai Xiang, a native of Putian and governor of Guangzhou, during the Northern Song dynasty. From the fifth year of Huang Yu, 1053 AD, to the fourth year of Jia Yu, 1059 AD, it took seven years and 14 million tails of silver to build this large stone bridge that spanned the river and connected to the sea. According to historical records, when the bridge was first built, it was 360 feet long and 15 feet wide, with warrior statues standing on both sides. The bridge construction project was huge in scale, with superb structural technology, making it famous worldwide. The Nanjing-Yangtze River Bridge was completed and ready for inspection. General Xu Shiyu, then the commander of the Nanjing military region, wanted to test whether the bridge could withstand the rigors of war. With the approval of the headquarters, at about eight o'clock on September 26, 1968, more than 80 tanks and over 60 vehicles of various types crossed the bridge in a column. Seeing the white marks left by the tracks, Commander Xu laughed and said, it's done. And now we see modern bridges costing hundreds of millions of dollars built under the CCP. The Yangmingtan Bridge, which cost 1.8 billion yuan, about 252 million USD to build, was opened to traffic less than a year ago. However, the steel bars and concrete have already deteriorated into tofu dregs. Four trucks rushed across it, causing the bridge to collapse, destroying vehicles and killing people. The scene was horrific. On January 4, 1999, the Chongqing-Qijiang Rainbow Bridge suddenly collapsed, leaving only the east and west bridge piers standing. The accident resulted in 40 deaths and 14 injuries. The bridge had been built in February 1996. Many young people may not even know that such a serious casualty incident occurred. At the site of the Tianjinjinan Expressway ramp bridge collapse, it was demolished before anyone else could take action. A flyover under demolition on Section 02 of Daisheng East Road in Hangzhou suddenly collapsed, causing one death and three injuries. Even more shocking was that just three days before the incident, hundreds of people were observing the construction site, which had been hailed as a model and example of safe construction in the city. The Gongguan Bridge in Wuyishan, Fujian, also collapsed. Many people were injured and killed in this accident. The construction quality was extremely poor, and most of the construction costs had been embezzled. These typical real-life examples provide us with a panoramic view of the construction sector in China. Large civil works should be carried out with great care and quality to ensure the safety of the people. On the contrary, officials have embezzled most of the project's funds, leaving only a small amount to create tofu-dreg projects that endanger the people of the mainland. This problem will never be solved as long as the CCP remains in power. Tofu construction in China, Foshan Building shakes, buildings in Wuhan are shaking too. Construction projects in China are nicknamed tofu by the people. Tofu projects and buildings have mushroomed under the CCP regime due to rampant corruption among officials and cadres. Corruption permeates from top to bottom, even in the construction sector, leading to the use of substandard materials, steel and cement. As a result, these constructions are of poor quality, with crumbling walls made of sand, concrete without reinforcement, and buildings that are very easy to collapse when unexpected incidents occur. Many cases of residential buildings and large traffic bridges collapsing have occurred in the mainland, causing significant loss of life. The number of such incidents increases every year, but the CCP regime continues to ignore this problem. China's shoddy construction projects are becoming more and more bizarre. In addition to the already common occurrences of building collapses, bridge collapses, and road collapses, the phenomenon of shaking buildings has recently appeared. On June 25th, the official website of the Housing, Urban-Rural Development, and Water Affairs Bureau of Changcheng District, Foshan City, Guangdong Province, issued a situation report stating that at about 15 Yunars on June 24th, 2024, Block A of Vanka Financial Center in Changcheng District shook slightly, and some people inside the building evacuated downstairs. After a preliminary investigation by experts, no damage to the main structure of the building, cracking of the surrounding site, or falling off of the curtain wall panels was found. Video posted online showed the high-rise building of Foshan Vanka Financial Center shaking violently. The footage showed that a high-rise building in the center of the city kept swaying, and employees inside fled downstairs to the open area below. Someone said, the whole building is shaking. In another scene, a potted plant placed on an employee's desk is seen shaking up and down, left and right. The female employee said, there's an earthquake. It keeps shaking. Look, oh, it's shaking so hard. No, it's the entire foundation shaking. However, Chinese media reported that the surrounding buildings of Tower A of the Financial Center did not shake, and people in Towers B and C of the nearby Financial Center within 100 meters also said they did not feel any obvious vibrations. Relevant staff from the Seismological Bureau even said that no earthquake occurred in Foshan and surrounding areas around 1530. Someone left a message on Weibo and said, wasn't the damping adjusted? I remember this happened in Shenzhen a few years ago. The Shenzhen Seg Plaza building also shook like this last time, and then part of the building on the roof was demolished. There have been road collapses here before. However, some people said it hints at a financial earthquake. Coincidentally, in addition to the phenomenon of swaying in the Vanka building in Foshan, there was also a phenomenon of swaying in a high-rise building as far away as Wuhan. On June 23rd, a high-rise residential building in Wuhan swayed inexplicably in the wind. The video posted online shows a building swaying left and right together with a nearby tree, and there is relative back and forth movement between two unit buildings. However, no residents were seen outside the building. Some netizens left comments under a related video on social media. How to deal with so much construction waste? Guangzhou has just collapsed and the buildings are shaking again. Although it has nothing to do with me, I really can't stand it. On June 21st, a residential building suddenly collapsed on Tianfu Road, Tianhe District, Guangzhou. Video footage showed that the collapsed stairs squeezed the exposed steel bars together and the scene was in chaos. Heart-wrenching cries were also heard in the video. A man said, someone is injured in the rubble. Call for help immediately. China's construction crisis, a catastrophic saga of tofu buildings and substandard safety. The quality and durability of commercial housing in China has come under scrutiny lately. Economist Ma Guangyuan claimed that due to poor construction standards and materials, most commercial housing built in China since 2000 will require major repairs within 30 years. In the Chinese real estate market, the majority of houses are substandard, especially those built after 2015. Many ordinary citizens have purchased houses at high prices but of low quality. Therefore, when people talk about what will happen after 70 years, you don't even need to consider the 70-year issue. It would be surprising if these houses could last for 70 years. That would be extremely conscientious. In my opinion, they may not even last for 70 years. Major renovations may be required after 30 years and there may be no way to address the issues effectively. He has all the reasons to make this statement. Not only that, Chinese infrastructure is also terrible in terms of quality. Ma Guangyuan cites shoddy foundations, unqualified wall materials and profit-driven developers cutting corners after 2000. Defects stay hidden initially. Chinese also lack a maintenance mindset, quickening deterioration. Surveillance video. A house collapsed in Wenzhou, killing four people. Some people ran to escape the moment it collapsed. A house collapsed near a market in Zhanghai District, Jiangmen, Guangdong. A gas explosion caused the building to collapse in a community in Tianjin. If a gas explosion in a room can cause this much damage, we have to question the quality of the house. Since 2000, surging prices made real estate seem hugely profitable. Construction, however, takes two to three years minimum, challenging quality control when rushing for buyers. Eager owners often accept flawed units just to gain deeds quickly. As prices climbed, some developers focused more on margins than standards, knowing defects get missed during resales. Buyers have little leverage, even if dissatisfied, as long as problems seem minor. Collapsing buildings is really not a rare sight in China. The slope protection of Yixin Community in Sichuan collapsed, causing serious damage to the building. The quality of China's building and infrastructure is so bad that even rain can cause collapse. Please share your thoughts in the comments section below. We will keep reporting on the Covid surge in China, so don't forget to subscribe to our channel and turn on the notification bell to get the latest videos. And thank you for tuning in.