‘Te Rehu o Waikato’ (the Mist of Waikato), also known as ‘The Waikato River Bridge’ is a 143m long five span bridge carrying SH1 over the Waikato River. The bridge was built as part of the Ngaruawahia Section (Stage 2) of the Waikato Expressway, under the NZ Transport Agency’s plans to upgrade SH1 in the northern Waikato region and the Roads of National Significance programme (RoNS).
Dan was the lead bridge engineer and bridge architect for the Te Rehu O Waikato whilst working at Beca Ltd as part of a Fletcher Construction led design and construct (D&C) tender.
- Overall bridge length – 143m
- 55m main span (75m between piers)0
- A total of 670 tonnes of superstructure steelwork
- Winner of a Steel Excellence Award of Merit 2015
- ACENZ Awards Finalist 2015
- Winner of NZ Health & Safety Awards.
- Part of the Te Awa – Great NZ River (cycle) Ride
The Waikato River is sacred to mana whenua and as such bridge piers were not permitted within the watercourse. The Project Team developed a composite steel ladder deck bridge supported on concrete V-shape piers that enabled a significant reduction of the main river span from 75m to 55m without the need for piers in the river. This reduction allowed for an efficient and slender steel superstructure. The tapered concrete V shape piers combine with independent steel ties to create an innovative structural form unique to New Zealand. This elegant and efficient structural form has been further enhanced by incorporating surface patterns reminiscent of traditional Moko (Maori Tattoos), which were developed in close consultation with local iwi artists to help connect the structure to the heritage of its surroundings.
Local mana whenua groups were involved with the design development and had a dawn blessing of the bridge and celebrated the location with carved pou at each end marking the river below to motorway drivers. NZ Transport Agency’s project manager said, “…the result is an outstanding bridge that Waikato Tainui take great pride in.” Gerry Brownlee (then Minister of Transport) officially opened this section of motorway in December 2013 from a podium on top of the bridge and welcomed the public to walk over it, and to this day the shared path underneath the bridge is extensively used for cycling, while many thousands of vehicles cross over the bridge on the expressway each day.
Commitment to H&S
Health and safety was at the forefront of the bridge design and construction from early on in the project. The Project Team ensured that a collaborative approach through workshops and regular ‘designer / constructor’ meetings was undertaken to identify hazards and agree mitigations for all phases of the bridge lifecycle. A key part of this was identifying the Principal’s (NZ Transport Agency) health and safety goals and then ensuring these were met in our design.
Due to the high number of effective safe design outcomes, the Waikato River Bridge was chosen as a case study for both an internal Beca safety training forum and an external Safety in Design (SiD) Training Day for Auckland Industry. The SiD outcomes were also part of the Beca submission which resulted in winning the 2014 New Zealand Workplace Health & Safety Supreme Award for best overall contribution to improving workplace health and safety.
Furthermore, the SiD outcomes were showcased in the July/August 2014 edition of New Zealand’s primary safety publication, Safeguard. We believe that sharing good examples of SiD can help promote the benefits of this process throughout the industry.
