Ponte Eiffel was inaugurated on June 30th, 1878, in the middle of the Cast-Iron Architecture age.
It was designed and planned by the prestigious Casa Eiffel. The metallic bridge which crosses the Lima River was not only built to permit railway traffic, but also to substitute the old wooden bridge that linked the public square of São Bento in Viana to the left bank of the Lima River in Darque. Measuring 563m in length and 6m in width, more than 2 000 000kg of iron were necessary to build the platforms which are placed on 9 granite masonry pillars whose bases can reach up to 22m in depth.