Engineering company Aurecon received two awards for civil engineering projects, while one of its engineers also received an award at the South African Institution of Civil Engineering (Saice) National Project Awards, held at the International Convention Centre in Durban on October 16.

The awards event promotes the upholding of quality and world-class standards and encourages its members to extend their skills to compete in the global arena.

The yearly awards event gives recognition to well-engineered civil projects that portray the art and science of civil engineering to the general public and aim to publicise how the profession finds answers to challenging problems.

The KwaMashu Interchange Upgrade in KwaZulu-Natal was announced the joint winner in the Technical Excellence category, while Malmesbury Wastewater Treatment Works (WWTW) in the Western Cape received a commendation in the same category. Both of these projects were also recipients of awards at the Consulting Engineers South Africa Aon Engineering Excellence Awards 2014.

In addition to these, Aurecon ground engineering expertise leader Dr Eduard Vorster was a joint winner of the Saice 2014 Engineer of the Year award, which was also presented at the Saice function. This award recognises a current Saice member who has demonstrated outstanding dedication to their fellow members, Saice, the profession and the local community.

KwaMashu Interchange Upgrade
The pioneering conversion of the standard diamond layout KwaMashu Interchange to an innovative diverging diamond layout has provided a low cost-effective means to enhance interchange capacity and safety.

It is the first application of a diverging diamond interchange (DDI) in the southern hemisphere.

A DDI is a unique interchange layout in which vehicles on an overpass or underpass crossroad at the interchange briefly cross over at a two-phase, signalised intersection to drive on the opposite (‘wrong’) side of the road, allowing free and unopposed right and left turns, to and from, the freeway ramps. After crossing over or under the freeway, the vehicles return to their normal left-hand lane.

The original KwaMashu Interchange carried high volumes of traffic in all directions, resulting in extreme congestion throughout the day, with queued backup extending onto the N2 northbound carriageway for several kilometres.

The introduction of the DDI concept for the KwaMashu Interchange Upgrade was successfully commissioned in June 2013. Aurecon states that it has improved capacity on the interchange and significantly reduced traffic and pedestrian conflict points, with a consequent reduction in accidents and a complete elimination of right-angled accidents.

Malmesbury WWTW
The Malmesbury WWTW treats wastewater from Malmesbury, a rapidly growing town to the north-east of Cape Town.

The original WWTW was overloaded and discharged substandard effluent into the nearby Diep river, exacerbated by periodic sludge spillages. The Department of Water Affairs withheld consent for new developments in this municipal area until the problem was resolved.

Aurecon proposed an innovative solution using a membrane bioreactor (MBR) and designed an ingenious hybrid system, incorporating the existing treatment works. The hybrid system made the use of MBR technology viable from a cost perspective and allowed the responsible operator, the Swartland municipality, to reuse the full dry weather flow.

At the time of project approval, there was only one MBR for a municipal wastewater treatment works that had been constructed in South Africa and it had still to be fully commissioned.

Dr Eduard Vorster
Vorster has experience in the installation and interpretation of wireless and fibre-optic sensor technologies. He has participated and led teams of researchers installing such sensors in pile foundations, onto pipelines and inside existing tunnels.

He supplemented his geotechnical and monitoring experience by gaining project management and documentation experience in Aurecon’s transportation division. Vorster was also involved in driving several prequalification processes for the operation and maintenance of toll road projects, and compilation of operation and maintenance documentation. In addition, he helped coordinate specialist design inputs between the client and concessionaire as part of the independent engineer on the Platinum Toll Highway. He also compiled operations and maintenance documentation for the Kruger Mpumalanga International Airport.

Vorster completed a PhD in Geotechnical Engineering at the University of Cambridge in 2005. During his PhD, he studied the complex interaction between existing pipelines and the surrounding soil during soft ground tunnel construction and published a number of papers in this regard, including a new design method for estimating pipeline forces when subjected to ground movement.

Aurecon South Africa MD Albert Geldenhuys says the Saice awards are highly recognised in the industry and are a good measure of technical excellence. “As such, they are also a good measure of the level of technical service we provide our clients and Aurecon’s ability to serve our clients’ best interests,” he concludes.