Puente de la Risa

The Risa bridge is perhaps the only architectural proof of the idea that Tomás Maestre had planned for the end of La Manga: a small residential Venice. This mini summer Venice, designed by the Catalan architect Antoni Bonet i Castellana, was to differ from the Italian city in one detail: it would also have road access.

The asphalt arteries that had been laid out in the project were as many as there are today, but it was still going to be necessary to build an access bridge to cross the Gola del Charco (one of the natural channels that cut through La Manga). This is how the Risa Bridge came into being.

Very little is known about its peculiar shape. Nor is it known for certain whether it was baptised and known by another name in its early years. What is known is that was built in 1978 in the style of the bridges of the Italian city.

The construction designed by the architect, with an arch that surpassed the semicircular arch and became almost ogival, resulted in such a pronounced cant that, when crossing it by car, it generates that feeling of emptiness in the stomach that makes many people laugh.