ICE France November 2012 regional weekend in Bordeaux – Pont Bacalan-Bastide
The predicted cold and rain held off as 22 ICE and joint institution members and partners gathered on the left bank of the Garonne for a return visit to the Pont Bacalan-Bastide lifting bridge in Bordeaux, courtesy of EGIS-JMI.
The last ICE visit was in April 2011 when the foundations were laid and the pylons had just started their "reach for the sky". Now they were complete and the 117-metre-long lifting span had just been delivered in one vast piece, all 2,500 tonnes of it, by barge from Venice, then installed in a nail-biting manœuvre just two weeks before.
The lifting mechanism is of classic simplicity but impressive scale; each pylon contains a 600 tonne counterweight, so the 100 residual tonnes of the lifting span can be lifted in some 11 minutes by two electric motors of just 132 KW each.
The two-lane each way dual carriageway across the bridge was having a waterproof surface applied under a temporary marquee structure, but we were able to be amongst the first to walk over the Garonne and back across via the pedestrian walkways of the new bridge.
We were guided by Mathieu Cardin, one of consultant Egis JMI’s senior engineers throughout the construction, who, aided by a video showing all the major construction stages, explained the progress that had been made since our last visit.
At the end of the visit, Lucy Rew, ICE France Chairman, thanked Mathieu for his interesting and detailed presentation. The group then concluded the first day of the weekend with a joint dinner at one of Bordeaux’s fine restaurants.
On Saturday we headed off to Saint Emilion where we were able to visit the Eglise Monolithe - a vast, underground church of cathedral-like proportions, excavated out of virgin rock by 11th and 12th century masons engineers, thus avoiding the building of walls and providing stone for building the village in one fell swoop. Our tour included St Emilion's hermitage and the Chapelle de la Trinité with its restored wall paintings.
After a robust lunch we made for the vignoble of the Chateau de Ferrand. An interesting combination of traditional methods and high-tech machinery produced a Grand Cru wine (now promoted to Grand Cru Classé in 2012) that was tasted and enjoyed.
Sunday provided the opportunity to walk some of the good food and wine off with a walking tour of the elegant mediaeval quarter of Bordeaux. The route included the 15th Century Grosse Cloche which dutifully tolled a tocsin at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month – just as it had on 8th May 1945 to celebrate victory. Lunch at a local restaurant ended the weekend and the group warmly thanked Lucy Rew for her organisation of this most enjoyable and informative event
Derek Gear CEng, Secretary of French Local Association and ICE Member in France, and Lucy Rew CEng, ICE France Chaiman and ICE Member in France