Bridge of Legions

The Bridge of Legions, in Czech Most Legii, crosses the Vltava between Prague's New Town and Mala Strana, brushing the small Strelecky Island midway. Built between 1898 and 1901 to designs by architect Antonin Balsanek, it replaced an earlier suspension bridge with a stone-arch structure topped by neo-Baroque corner pavilions. Since 1919 its name has commemorated the Czechoslovak Legions, who fought alongside the Entente against Austria-Hungary in the First World War and were decisive in the founding of Czechoslovakia in 1918. Today trams 9, 22 and 23, cars and pedestrians share the crossing, with views upstream to Charles Bridge and downstream to the National Theatre.