Week of 18 December
1. BESIX Infra: The ‘most beautiful street’ in Antwerp is getting a facelift (Belgium)
BESIX Infra has been awarded a contract to carry out complete infrastructure works at the Cogels-Osylei, in Antwerp, together with Frateur-De Pourcq. This avenue is known as ‘the most beautiful street’ in the city and is famous for its heritage houses from the ‘Belle Epoque’ period, dating back to the end of the 19th century.
The street will be completely renovated, after opening the existing tram lanes and replacing existing pavements and sewers. Many of the houses in the street, including their driveways, are protected heritage sites, hence bringing an extra challenge in the connection works to the sewage system.
All together, the biggest challenge for the site will be the logistical aspects, the presence of historical buildings, the challenging execution time, and the presence of many utility lines, which must be moved prior to the works, to avoid perturbing surrounding sites like the Berchem train station. After a few months of study time, the actual work on site will start in May 2024.
Bravo to BESIX Infra for the contract and all the best for this prestigious infrastructure project.
2. Double news from Vanhout (Belgium)
Yasmine Van Roosbroeck, BIM manager at Vanhout has been selected among the ‘40 Construction Champions under 40’ worldwide by Autodesk, the leading global software and technology company. ‘40 under 40’ is an annual global awards programme that recognises both established and upcoming impact-makers in architecture, engineering, and construction. Yasmine: “It's an honour to be part of such an innovative industry, and I'm incredibly grateful for the opportunity to contribute towards its growth.” Congratulations Yasmine for this remarkable recognition!
On December 7th, Vanhout hosted a productive meeting for the BESIX Procurement Community, welcoming colleagues from France, the Netherlands, and Belgium. The participants engaged in a series of workshops focusing on procurement strategies, tools, and templates. Additionally, they conducted an insightful analysis of each entity's figures to explore potential synergies and one-stop shop opportunities within the group. The event concluded with informative tours of two Vanhout facilities: HBS, its subsidiary specialising in high-quality joinery and wooden finishing for offices, shops, and more, as well as its logistics and steel department.
3. Barangaroo station is nearing completion (Australia)
BESIX Watpac’s team at Barangaroo Metro Station achieved substantial completion. The figures are impressive: 1.4 million hours worked, 7,766 pieces of sandstone and 21,000 lineal meters of cable tray installed, over 170,000 individual blocks laid and 150 number of concrete pours carried out. A big shout out to our colleagues in Sydney, whose dedication and hard work over the past two years have made this beautiful project possible.
4. A major arrival at Nachtigal (Cameroon)
The Nachtigal instream flow plant (located at the main dam) is now fully assembled: the photos below show the arrival of its 5 MW Kaplan turbine. The various components of its shroud are also in place (for the hydraulic engineers among you, these are the round-to-square transition, the fore-distributor, the distributor, the impeller shroud and the aspirator). Once connected, this turbine will generate electricity from the flow in the short-circuited section of the Sanaga Falls. The electricity produced will be used to power the plant's offices. As a reminder, the Sanaga river will supply the 420 MW hydroelectric plant downstream via the intake canal, which will cover almost 30 % of the country's needs.
And then this... Things are moving at Triangle (France)
Aiming to start the façade works before year's end, the Triangle tower project in Paris celebrated a significant achievement with the installation of the first façade panel last Friday. Kudos to our Paris team for reaching this major milestone. Best of luck with the installation of the remaining 8,899 panels!
Additionally, last week marked the announcement of the hotel operator for the 13th to 18th floors of the tower: Radisson Blu brand. The hotel will feature 128 rooms, a sky bar, and a restaurant offering a stunning view of the Eiffel Tower.
