Features

New technologies are coming to market with regard to driving and supporting tunnels, with drilling and blasting and accompanying shotcreating technologies being widely used worldwide. Drilling and blasting can be a cost-effective method in the right conditions and in this segment Atlas Copco and Sandvik hold major market shares worldwide, although other firms such as Furukawa and Montabert also compete. Shotcreting equipment is widely used following after drilling and blasting, with CIFA broadening its rang

Infrastructure investment means that the road tunnel construction sector is healthy due to demand for new links – Mike Woof reports With many emergent nations investing heavily in infrastructure, the tunnelling sector is seeing extensive business at present. Tunnels provide key links in mountainous areas or in congested cities where building roads on the surface may not be practical. In Asia and Latin America, many key road connections are now being built underground to pass challenging terrain or provide

Asphalt plants were recently delivered for use in the biggest road construction project in Latin America. Meanwhile, a US navy base has just received a plant Guy Woodford reports Spanning around 1,000km, the Ruta del Sol highway in Colombia is the largest road build works currently taking place in Latin America. Brazilian company Odebrecht, part of the Ruta del Sol Concessionaire group working on sector 2 of the highway stretching 528km from Puerto Salgar to San Roque, connecting the capital Bogota to the

Sateco says its new detensioning spacer unit being showcased at this month Intermat 2012 event in Paris is a world first for the construction industry. The product is fitted with a side nut that acts as a valve, releasing the force acting on the formwork rod after concrete has dried. When the side nut is manoeuvred, the detensioning spacer unit is moved, thus releasing the pressure acting on the main nut. The main nut is then easier to unscrew, allowing faster and less strenuous form removal. Product design

RMD Kwikform has supplied its 80kN Rapidshor shoring for the widening of the Tolo Highway, running between the Island House Interchange and Tai Hang in Hong Kong. The project, overseen by main contractor Gammon Construction and set to be completed by the end of 2013, will widen the Tolo Highway from a two to four-lane carriageway in each direction, alleviating traffic congestion. “We were approached by [project] sub-contractors, United Soundfair and Richwell Engineering to supply shoring and formwork suppor

Rapid urban growth is resulting in massive mega cities with major transport needs and Mexico City is one of the world’s largest – Mike Woof reports Mexico City is a vast, sprawling metropolis and one of the world’s largest cities, resulting in huge problems for its inhabitants, particularly with regard to infrastructure. Measuring population size is an inexact science for large cities as suburban areas can add to the figures considerably, especially in developing nations where unplanned expansion is as comm

New and highly regarded existing formwork systems have been used in major recent transport-related construction projects across the globe. Guy Woodford looks at some of their applications The multi-million dollar Mississippi River Bridge project in the United State is creating a vital new gateway between Illinois and Missouri. Central to the project is the realignment and reconstruction of Interstate 70 and a new landmark bridge, featuring two pylons projecting vertically from the Mississippi river bed w

Australia's increasingly popular 12D Model software package for road design, terrain modelling, surveying and drainage has been selected as the main design and survey tool for the coordinated earthquake rebuild of Christchurch in New Zealand The 12D Model software will be the common platform for a group of consultants and contractors making up the recently formed SCIRT, standing for "Stronger Christchurch Infrastructure Rebuild Team". They will use it for survey, repair and rebuild of both the road netwo

Transport and traffic analysis nowadays tends to switch between static analysis modelling for large scale studies and microsimulation for finer grain work, with perhaps the mesoscopic model also finding a place for mid-level. Most producers make software tools at all three levels and increasingly package them together. Spanish firm TSS (Transport Simulation Systems) has gone one better with its latest release Aimsum 7, by giving it the capacity to "zoom in" from a larger scale mesoscopic model to a smaller

One of Canada's largest provinces, Ontario, has decided to go with the latest Power InRoads suite of design tools now being offered by Bentley Systems as a complete stand-alone version As well as the Inroads tools, that means Ontario's Ministry of Transportation will use drafting and document production by the MicroStation CAD tool, and mapping and GIS functionality from Bentley Map. It previously used InRoads for highways work but on an AutoCAD platform. The whole new package is also designed to work co

One of Canada's largest provinces, Ontario, has decided to go with the latest Power InRoads suite of design tools now being offered by Bentley Systems as a complete stand-alone version As well as the Inroads tools, that means Ontario's Ministry of Transportation will use drafting and document production by the MicroStation CAD tool, and mapping and GIS functionality from Bentley Map. It previously used InRoads for highways work but on an AutoCAD platform. The whole new package is also designed to work co

In the fast moving world of construction software, major innovations are happening on a continuous basis. All the leading players are making notable contributions to the sector. A new strategic alliance just announced between the management and data handling software giant Pitney Bowes, and design and construction software producer Autodesk, will help create an end to end range of products and tools for rapidly evolving BIM strategies in the industry. In particular in should help develop an integrated suite

Lower temperature mixes – a key advance in bitumen technology - Kristina Smith reports Warm and cold mix asphalts were not on the original agenda for this year’s Eurasphalt & Eurobitume Congress, being held in Istanbul in June. But when the organisers took a look through the papers submitted for their sustainability-themed event, they realised that this is one of the industry’s hottest topics. “We hadn’t quite anticipated the high level of research in this area,” says E&E’s technical programme committee c

Hillhead 2012, the three-day biennial flagship event for the quarrying, recycling and heavy construction industries, is set to be a sell-out. Guy Woodford looks at what a number of major companies will be exhibiting during the show being held next month at Buxton Quarry in Derbyshire With 400 exhibitors already confirmed Hillhead 2012, taking place 19-21 June, is set to draw bumper crowds and provide crucial new business opportunities for companies involved in quarrying, recycling and heavy construction. Ca

A huge $5 billion Brazilian mine project together with extensive infrastructure developments is expected to create 8,000 jobs Huge export opportunities in Brazil, including equipment for aggregate production and highway construction, are being highlighted by the UK Construction Equipment Association (CEA). UK Trade & Investment (UKTI) has appointed the CEA to deliver a UK Information Share Fair and extended Trade Mission to Brazil to promote a major high value opportunity for UK manufacturers and service pr