An 8,000 tonne, 227m-long cantilever whose structural steel weighs more than the iron in the Eiffel Tower, has been lifted into place to join together two towers in Dubai.
The Link forms part of developer Ithra Dubai’s One Za’abeel mixed-use project. Main contractor Alec Engineering and Contracting embraced 4D modelling with Bentley’s Synchro for the project, which it was claimed knocked 70 days off the programme and saved £12.5m.
Marine ecologists have developed an innovative concrete brick that is designed to mimic natural rock and coral. The ECOncrete range of products have been designed to enhance biodiversity and marine and coastal infrastructure on urban coastlines. The business was founded by marine ecologists Dr Shimrit Perkol-Finkel and Dr Ido Sella and produces custom-made bricks for each location to encourage growth of flora and fauna.
An automatic bricklaying machine developed by Pocklington-based Construction Automation is constructing the first home in the UK to be built by a robot. The Automatic Brick Laying Robot (ABLR) started work on the three-bedroom home in Everingham in Yorkshire this week. It will lay all the bricks, blocks, and mortar. Only two people are required to work on each house – a labourer to load the machine and a skilled person to install tie bars, damp courses and lintels and to do the pointing.
Kier Highways is to trial a new airbag in the Midlands that protects workers and warns drivers that work is underway. The large, bright airbags can be inflated in under 10 minutes. Kier started using the barrier on a slip road at the A45/A46 Stivichall interchange in Coventry in October. The £95,700 cost of the airbags trial was met through the Highways Agency’s Designated Funds programme.
BAM Nuttall has built a new sea wall in Marine Parade, Dawlish, Devon after the existing defences were battered to the point of failure, threatening the main railway route into the south west.
The new sea wall involved the construction of concrete foundations to house a precast nib section during short tidal windows. A separate precast facing panel sits in the nib, tied to the existing wall behind.
The void between the existing wall and facing panels was then infilled with ready-mixed concrete before a paving concrete was laid on top to create a widened pedestrian walkway.
Skanska has completed the UK’s first Dutch-style roundabout, which prioritises pedestrians and cyclists over motorists. The works to redesign the existing roundabout at the junction of Queen Edith’s Way and Fendon Road in Cambridge were delivered by Skanska on behalf of Cambridgeshire County Council.
The world’s biggest photography competition for the built environment, the Art of Building, has launched. The competition is free to enter and open to anyone aged 18 or over. Entries can be made from 12 October 2020 until 15 November 2020.
Winners will be announced on 26 January 2021. There are two awards to be won: the £1,500 Judges’ Prize, chosen by the judges, and the £1,500 Public Choice Award chosen by the public through an online vote.
Last year’s winners included Pedro Luis Ajuriaguerra Saiz, a professional photographer from northern Spain, who was awarded the Judges’ Prize for capturing Hemisferic, a science museum in Valencia (pictured above). For more details about the competition and to enter, log on to www.artofbuilding.org.
