CSIC Industry Partners Crossrail, London Underground and Senceive have won top awards at the 2015 New Civil Engineer International Tunnelling and Underground Space Awards.
The annual awards, held in London, recognise excellence in international tunnelling and underground space projects.
Jennifer Schooling, Director of CSIC, said: “"We would like to congratulate our forward-thinking Industry Partners on their awards which are justly deserved. A key component of CSIC's success to date has emerged from close collaboration with our Industry Partners to develop smart technologies and tools for early implementation. Crossrail, London Underground and Senceive are pioneers of innovation in construction and CSIC's collaboration with them will help deliver world-beating advantages to UK infrastructure."
A key component of CSIC's success to date has emerged from close collaboration with our Industry Partners to develop smart technologies and tools for early implementation.
• Crossrail, currently Europe’s largest infrastructure project, won the Judge’s Supreme Award - Crossrail tunnelling began in 2012 and ended at Farringdon in May with the break through of tunnelling machine Victoria. Eight 1,000 tonne tunnelling machines bored 26 miles or 42 km of new 6.2m diameter rail tunnels under London.
CSIC PhD student Mehdi Alhaddad was shortlisted for this year’s Design Innovation Award for his CSattAR monitoring system, in collaboration with Crossrail C704, for the convergence monitoring of the Central Line influenced by Crossrail's TBM crossing.
• London Underground won the prestigious Global Tunnelling Project of the Year (under $500m) Award for the Bond Street station upgrade and Rehabilitation Project of the Year - as part of Transport for London’s (TfL's) multi-billion pound investment programme to improve and expand the transport network, the Bond Street Station upgrade project team are reconfiguring the station to provide 30 per cent more capacity. The new ticket hall, currently under construction beneath Marylebone Lane, will open in 2017.
• Senceive and AECOM won the Ground Investigation and Monitoring Award for the Great Western Electrification Project: Box Tunnel Track Lower - during this major construction task the structural integrity of the tunnel was monitored and gave engineers remote access in real-time. Senceive, using its third generation FlatMesh solution and working in partnership with AECOM, implemented a novel and innovative wire-and-mains-power -free monitoring system over the 3km tunnel length. Despite extremely constrained access, the system, comprising 250 tilt sensors, operated in a robust and highly reliable manner throughout the engineering works.
Simon Wright, Crossrail Programme Director, said: “This award is fantastic recognition for everyone who works on Crossrail. Over the last three years, our highly skilled team have worked tirelessly to build these major tunnels under one of the world’s busiest cities.”
Nick Brown, Managing Director, London Underground, said: “Over 200 engineers and staff have been working on site at Bond Street 24-hours-a-day, for two years. This complex station upgrade – beneath an extraordinarily small footprint on Oxford Street – has been largely constructed out-of-sight, all while keeping this essential station open to the public. When the station upgrade is complete it will dramatically increase transport capacity in the heart of London’s busiest shopping district and I thank our customers for their patience while this work continues.”
Graham Smith, Senceive CEO, said: “Senceive has over a decade of experience in developing and deploying wireless Remote Condition Monitoring (RCM) solutions for rail and construction applications. We are delighted to receive this award which recognises the benefits of the FlatMesh system deployed successfully in their thousands and used by most rail and construction companies in the UK.”
Mark Hansford, Editor, New Civil Engineer, said: “The UK tunnelling industry is booming. It is booming because the UK government has seen the clear need for infrastructure and because it recognises that the tunnelling community can and will deliver - on time and budget. And that is why it is great to be able to showcase what the industry can do at NCE’s Tunnelling and Underground Space Awards. Over the five years’ of the awards we have rewarded some fantastic projects and people. And that's crucial, because in this industry skilled, experienced people are everything.”