Pont Cessart, Road bridge in Saumur, France

Pont Cessart is a 276.76 m long stone arch bridge over the Loire in Saumur, linking the old town to the Île d'Offard. It has twelve segmental arches with spans of 19.5 m, carried on eleven piers 3.9 m thick, and a level roadway with two lanes, marked cycle paths and stone parapets.

A first bridge, the Pont de Sept-Voies, stood a few metres upstream from 1230. In 1752 Louis-Alexandre de Cessart was sent to repair two arches, but he and Jean-Baptiste de Voglie agreed on a complete rebuild. Work began in May 1756; after two years of difficult cofferdams, the Westminster Bridge caissons of Charles Labelye were used in France for the first time. The bridge was finished in 1770, rebuilt after 1944, and overhauled in 2020.

The bridge serves as a central connection point in Saumur, offering views of the Loire River and the medieval castle that rises above the city. It has become a natural place where locals and visitors cross while taking in the river landscape.

The bridge is easy to walk across with wide, flat sidewalks and clear orientation on the level surface. Cyclists get separate paths, making the crossing comfortable for all types of travelers.

This bridge stands out for its completely level roadway design, which differs from earlier bridge models that incorporated central inclines into their structure. This flat design was a technical innovation at the time of its construction and was later adopted in many modern bridges.