This semester first year Civil and Structural Engineering students from the School of Energy, Geoscience, Infrastructure and Society attended a range of site visits to learn more about the civil engineering industry and experience real life on construction sites.
Students were first given a tour of the Edinburgh Quartermile development by Quartermile Construction Manager, Alan Laidlaw with assistance from his Sir Robert McAlpine colleagues. Students were given a glimpse of a genuine engineering environment and were able to ask a range of questions as well as learn about the entire development process.
Student Kyle Marshall said: "The visit to Quartermile was a fascinating first site visit with my Civil Engineering programme. It was very insightful seeing different aspects of this construction, right from the foundations up to the finished flat."
The School then took students on a site visit to the new Queensferry Crossing, where they were shown around the site by Ewen MacDonell from the Forth Crossing Bridge Constructors consortium. Students also visited the docks in Rosyth where many of the parts for the new bridge are assembled followed by a trip to the embankment which is being constructed on the north side and a visit to the south side to look at the viaduct that is currently being pushed out from the south shore.
Finally the students visited the Craigmillar bridge gauging site where they were given a tour by staff from Balfour Beatty who are working with Network Rail to rebuild two bridges over the south suburban railway. The project was particularly interesting for students as it showed the complexity of service diversions required even for a fairly small project.
To view images of the site visits please go to the EGIS Facebook page.