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Infrastructures are a key factor for economy. Among them, transportation infrastructures are vital for human life and economy. And within the transportation networks, bridges are key elements for connecting people and delivering goods. For this reason, bridges have been built since many centuries ago and, in some way, the advances (and sometimes geographical expansions !!) of ancient cultures all over the world have been related to their ability of constructing permanent bridges. The most representative of this could be the Roman Empire. After many centuries of bridge construction, nowadays we face a long history of experiences that allow us to look to the evolution of bridge engineering along years and, based on that, to try to extrapolate what is the most feasible to come in the next future. The evolution in bridge engineering has been strongly linked to the key advances in the following areas: materials, construction processes and modelling. Construction techniques and bridge typologies at the beginning were governed by the mechanical properties and performance of available materials at that time. In fact, when the available materials were stone and masonry ( materials that work well in compression but not in tension), the characteristic bridge type was the arch and the construction process the scaffolding of the complete structure because the arch action needs the complete structure to develop. For centuries the arch was the only available bridge type regarding permanent bridges. Of course, suspension and beam configurations were also available but normally with temporary use due to the durability limitations of materials working in tension (vegetal fibres) and bending (timber). Only the appearance in the 19 th

The Bridges of the Future or the Future of Bridges?