New Zealand Bridge Wins at International Footbridge Awards

7 July 2011

N E W S R E L E A S E

New Zealand Bridge Wins at International Footbridge Awards

New Plymouth’s eye-catching Te Rewa Rewa Bridge has just won another major international award.

The shared pedestrian and cycle bridge over the city’s Waiwhakaiho River beat out six European contenders at the Footbridge Awards in Poland to win the Aesthetics Medium Award (for bridges with spans between 30m and 75m long).

Mayor Harry Duynhoven says the award is recognition of the innovation among designers and engineers in New Zealand.

“These awards are hotly contested and it’s a huge boost for our industries for a New Zealand bridge to be judged the best in any category,” says Mayor Duynhoven.

“The judges chose more finalists than usual this year because competition was particularly fierce in the medium and long-span categories. Some of the categories split the judges but they were unanimous about Te Rewa Rewa, saying it was the clear winner.”

The judges said of Te Rewa Rewa Bridge: “Stunning iconic structure, yet simple form with excellent attention to detail. The use of arch and ribs to produce the skeletal form is very well done. The change from a traditional elevation to the more oblique views gives this one the wow factor.”

This is the second international award for Te Rewa Rewa Bridge. In April it became the first in the southern hemisphere to win the Arthur G. Hayden Medal from the International Bridge Conference, which recognises outstanding achievement in bridge engineering that demonstrates innovation in special-use bridges (such as pedestrian, people-mover or non-traditional structures).

Te Rewa Rewa Bridge is a 70m single-span bridge. The vision of an iconic bridge was conceived by New Plymouth District Council and funded by NPDC, NZ Transport Agency and the Whitaker Family Trust. The design-build contract for Te Rewa Rewa Bridge was won by New Plymouth company Whitaker Civil Engineering Limited in a consortium with Novare Design Ltd and CPG, with subcontractor Fitzroy Engineering.

The bridge opened on 5 June last year as part of the extension northward of the Coastal Walkway, making possible a 10km off-road route for cycling, walking, running, skateboarding and rollerblading.
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The Footbridge Awards started in 2002 in Paris and are held every three years to accompany the triennial conference on footbridge technology. They are sponsored and organised by Bridge design and engineering magazine (www.bridgeweb.com) with independent judges to assess the entries.

This year’s awards had 55 entries from 18 different countries, which were whittled down to shortlists of up to seven projects in each of the six award categories.

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