View source for Megyeri Bridge

{{Infobox Bridge
|bridge_name=Megyeri Bridge
| native_name         = Megyeri Híd
| native_name_lang    = Hungarian
|image=Megyeri híd.jpg
|caption=Megyeri Bridge at night
|official_name=
|carries= [[M0 motorway (Hungary)|M0 beltway of Budapest]]
|crosses=[[Danube]]
|locale=[[Budapest]]
|maint=
|id=
|design=[[cable-stayed bridge]]
|mainspan={{convert|300|m|ft|0|abbr=on}}
|length={{convert|1862|m|ft|0|abbr=on}}
|width=
|height={{convert|100|m|ft|0|abbr=on}}
|load=
|clearance=
|below={{convert|30|m|ft|0|abbr=on}}
|traffic=
|open=September 30, 2008
|closed=
|toll=
|map_cue=
|map_image=
|map_text=
|map_width=
|coordinates= {{coord|47.60722|N|19.09222|E}}
|lat=
|long=
}}

The '''Megyeri Bridge''' ({{langx|hu|Megyeri Híd}}, {{IPA|hu|ˈmɛɟɛri ˈhiːd}}), previously known as the '''Northern M0 Danube bridge''', is a [[cable-stayed bridge]] that spans the [[Danube|River Danube]] between [[Buda]] and [[Pest (city)|Pest]], respectively the west and east sides of [[Budapest]], the capital of [[Hungary]]. 
It is an important section of the [[M0 motorway (Hungary)|M0]] [[beltway|ringroad]] around Budapest.

The bridge cost 63{{nbs}}billion [[Hungarian forint|forints]] ({{abbr|approx.|approximately}} {{US$}}300M) and was officially opened on September 30, 2008;<ref name=bridge_opened>{{cite news|url=http://index.hu/gazdasag/magyar/megya080930/|title=Átadták a csodahidat "Wonder bridge opens"|publisher=Index.hu|date=September 30, 2008}}</ref> however, the National Transport Authority of Hungary has only issued temporary permits because of disagreement among suburban cities surrounding the bridge.

An online naming poll to determine the new name of the recently built bridge caused controversy and received media attention when American comedians [[Stephen Colbert]] and [[Jon Stewart]] won. Hungary eventually named it the Megyeri Bridge.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Post |first=The Washington Post {{!}} The Washington |date=2014-12-17 |title=Stephen Colbert’s fake character fomented real-life controversy |url=https://www.denverpost.com/2014/12/17/stephen-colberts-fake-character-fomented-real-life-controversy/ |access-date=2025-06-29 |website=The Denver Post |language=en-US}}</ref>

==Gallery==
<gallery class="center">
Image:Megyeri híd2.jpg
Image:Megyeri bridge under construction.jpg
Image:Civertanmegyeri1.jpg
Image:Civertanmegyeri2.jpg
Image:Civertanmegyeri3.jpg
Image:Civertanmegyeri4.jpg
Image:Civertanmegyeri5.jpg
Image:Civertanmegyeri6.jpg
</gallery>

==Technical information==

The total length of the bridge is 1862m. 
Structurally it is composed of five parts:

#Left quayside inundation area bridge: 148m
#Main Danube-branch bridge (cable stayed): 590m with a span of 300m
#[[Szentendre Island]] inundation area bridge: 559m
#Szentendre Danube-branch bridge: 332m
#Right quayside inundation area bridge: 218m

==Naming poll==
The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Transport of [[Hungary]] organized a public vote online to solicit possible names for the new bridge. The three names with the most votes, as well as suggestions from local governments, cartographers, linguists and other experts, were to be reviewed by a government committee before a final name for the bridge was chosen. New nominations were accepted until August 21, 2006, and the voting ended on September 8, 2006.

On August 1, 2006, Reuters reported that the top candidate according to the online poll was the "Chuck Norris híd", named for American action star [[Chuck Norris]].<ref>{{cite news|url=http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyID=2006-08-01T094605Z_01_L01355692_RTRIDST_0_OUKOE-UK-HUNGARY-BRIDGE.XML |title=Chuck Norris leads vote for Budapest bridge name |publisher=Reuters |date=August 8, 2006 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051225103258/http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews |archive-date=December 25, 2005 }}</ref> ([[Chuck Norris facts]] reached the height of their popularity around this time.) On August 9, 2006, American [[satirist]] Stephen Colbert discussed the story on his comedy program ''[[The Colbert Report]]'', instructing his viewers to visit the polling website and vote for him instead of Norris. On August 15, 2006, he repeated his call to be voted top of the Hungarian poll. The next day the number of votes for him had grown 230 times, and he now asked his viewers to follow a link from his own "Colbert Nation" website, to avoid "all that illegible Hungarian". Colbert's site also indirectly offered techniques for "stuffing the ballot box"{{Citation needed|date=March 2009}}, as users of their [[Internet forum|forum]]s created several automated [[Scripting language|scripts]] to cast multiple votes for Colbert.{{Citation needed|date=March 2009}} By August 22, 2006, the "Stephen Colbert híd" was in first with 17 million votes, about 14 million votes ahead of the second-placed ''Zrínyi híd'', named after the Croatian-Hungarian national hero, [[Miklós Zrínyi]], and about 7 million more than the entire population of Hungary. The same day, the site announced a new round of voting, which would require registration to participate, and Colbert asked his viewers to "call off the dogs", requesting on his website that fans stop using scripts to vote. Despite this, the "Stephen Colbert híd" remained in the top position on the website in the second round.

On September 14, 2006, [[András Simonyi]]—the ambassador of [[Hungary]] to the United States—announced on ''[[The Colbert Report]]'' that [[Stephen Colbert (character)|Stephen Colbert]] had won the vote.  Unfortunately for Colbert, Ambassador Simonyi declared that under Hungarian law, Colbert would have to be fluent in Hungarian, and would have to be deceased in order to have the bridge named for him. However, after saying the rules could most likely be bent, he invited Colbert to visit Hungary and view the construction in person and gave him a Hungarian passport and a [[:Image:HUF 10000 1997 obverse.jpg|10,000]] [[Hungarian forint|HUF Bill]], with an approximate value of, as the ambassador put it, 'fifty dollars, fifty good US dollars'. Colbert promptly tried to bribe him with said money.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://indavideo.hu/video/A_Stephen_Colbert_hid_sztori_vege| title = A "Stephen Colbert híd" sztori vége - indavideo.hu}} </ref>

===Results===
{{col-begin}}
{{col-2}}

{| class="wikitable"
|+ Round 1 Top Five<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.m0hid.gov.hu/elsofordulo|title=M0-ás híd portál|publisher=gkm.gov.hu|date=September 8, 2006|archive-date=October 13, 2006|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061013175930/http://www.m0hid.gov.hu/elsofordulo}}</ref>
! Name
! Votes
! Percentage
|-
!width=175|[[Stephen Colbert]] híd
|17231725
|53%
|-
![[Nikola Šubić Zrinski|Zrínyi]] híd
|2062649
|6%
|-
!Pató Pál híd
|1805118
|6%
|-
![[Gabriel Bethlen|Bethlen Gábor]] híd
|1735587
|5%
|-
![[Matthias Corvinus of Hungary|Hunyadi Mátyás]] híd
|1478020
|5%
|}

{{col-2}}

{| class="wikitable"
|+ Round 2 Top Five<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.m0hid.gov.hu/toplista|title=M0-ás híd portál|publisher=gkm.gov.hu|date=September 8, 2006|archive-date=October 13, 2006|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061013180827/http://www.m0hid.gov.hu/toplista}}</ref>
! Name
! Votes
! Percentage
|-
!width=175|[[Stephen Colbert]] híd
|93163
|25%
|-
![[Jon Stewart]] híd
|85171
|23%
|-
![[Nikola Šubić Zrinski|Zrínyi]] híd
|83966
|23%
|-
![[József Eötvös|Eötvös]] híd
|37042
|10%
|-
![[Perl|Perl-Script]] híd
|17354
|5%
|}

{{col-end}}

=== Megyeri Bridge ===

On September 28, 2006, it was announced that the bridge will be named "'''Megyeri Bridge'''", even though that name did not make it to the second round. The Hungarian Geographical Name Committee justified the final name by explaining that the bridge connects [[Újpest|Káposztás''megyer'']] and [[Békásmegyer|Békás''megyer'']].<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.online.rtlklub.hu/hirek/hazank/?id=0609231745 |title=The M0 Bridge named as Megyeri Bridge |publisher=RTLKlub.hu |date=September 28, 2006 }}{{dead link|date=April 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

==See also==
*[[List of crossings of the Danube River]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
{{Commons category|Megyeri Bridge}}
*[https://3dwarehouse.sketchup.com/model/6fc141b5d35ff870ece3701056e06121/Megyeri-h%C3%ADd-M0-%C3%A9szaki-Duna-h%C3%ADd Google Earth 3D model of the bridge]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20070206142247/http://dbridges.fw.hu/hidak/m0hid.html Megyeri híd - pictures and articles] {{in lang|hu}}
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20071211022047/http://www.panoramio.com/user/510240/tags/h%C3%ADd%26comments_page%3D1%26photos_page%3D5 Photos of Budapest bridges]
*[https://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=alPVoF3BlYO8&refer=europe Bloomberg article]
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jpq3oMqg2p4 Computer generated video of the Northern M0 Danube bridge]
*[http://index.hu/gazdasag/magyar/hid060721/ Index.hu article] {{in lang|hu}}
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20150722045716/http://metros.hu/terkep/metrosterkep.html Public transport map of Budapest (with bridges)] {{in lang|en|hu}}
*{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20081021162527/http://www.bridgesofbudapest.com/bridge/megyeri_bridge Bridges of Budapest - Megyeri Bridge]}}
*[http://www.civertan.hu/legifoto/legifoto.php?page_level=2528 Aerial photographs of the bridge]

{{coord|47|36|25.68|N|19|5|31.97|E|region:HU-BU_type:landmark|display=title}}

{{Budapest}}
{{Bridges of Budapest}}
{{The Colbert Report}}

[[Category:Cable-stayed bridges in Hungary]]
[[Category:Bridges in Budapest]]
[[Category:Bridges over the Danube]]
[[Category:Bridges completed in 2008]]