The call is out for people across the region to place their vote – not in a new Brexit referendum – but for the reconstruction of Tadcaster Bridge as the world’s favourite engineering achievement.
The Institution of Civil Engineers has named North Yorkshire County Council’s rebuilding of Tadcaster Bridge as one of the world’s top projects for its 2018 People’s Choice Awards.
The awards celebrate the world’s best civil engineering projects that have made a positive impact for communities.
County Councillor Don Mackenzie, North Yorkshire’s Executive Member for Highways, said:
We are thrilled to be placed among the world’s top ten for our work on reconstructing the bridge.
We now want everybody to vote for Tadcaster and place it on the world map. Voting closes on September 28th, so time is short!
Because of the importance of the bridge to Tadcaster’s community, the County Council started the Herculean task of reconstruction only two and half weeks after the bridge’s collapse during the devastating floods of December 2015. The council pulled out all the stops to complete a project – which would normally take about two years – in half the time.
The 18th century grade two listed bridge was reconstructed and widened with £3m from the Government and £1.4m from the York, North Yorkshire and East Riding Local Enterprise Partnership.
Its completion drew thanks from the Prime Minister for the skill and hard work of the construction teams. The Institution of Civil Engineers has described the task as a challenging, “high-profile, sensitive and complex project requiring specialist and traditional construction skills”.
County Councillor Don Mackenzie added:
The rebuilding of Tadcaster Bridge was a great feat of engineering and we are immensely proud of the high skill of our engineers and construction workers.
But we worked very closely with the people of Tadcaster and the whole project became a great community success story. So let’s all get behind the People’s Choice and vote for Tadcaster!
People need to go to the following link to place their vote.
www.ice.org.uk/what-is-civil-engineering/what-do-civil-engineers-do/the-repair-of-tadcaster-bridge
County council films about the reconstruction of the bridge and the reuniting of the community can be found on https://youtu.be/VMMcID7leJo
