Kings Lock wins engineering award
8 July 2008
The extension to the Kings Lock office has scooped the Institution of Civil Engineer’s (ICE’s) Thames Valley Branch Engineering Excellence award for Environmental Project of the Year.
Kings has the smallest lock office on the River Thames but welcomes the second largest number of visitors, with thousands of boaters, ramblers and day trippers passing through every year. The new centre, built entirely from low-carbon or locally sourced materials, was the brainchild of lock keeper, Leigh Fenton, and relief lock keeper Sarah Markham. Opening on the lock’s 80th anniversary earlier this year, the building has been used to trial ‘green’ products and building techniques for use in future projects on the River Thames and throughout the Environment Agency.
The centre, which took seven weeks to build, was funded by the Environment Agency’s Carbon Reduction Fund, set up to help reduce its carbon usage. Among the building’s green credentials are foundations made from used car tyres, walls made from locally produced straw bales and faced with lime render, timber that is either re-used, unwanted or from sustainable forests and Photovoltaic cells on the roof to generate electricity.
ICE Thames Valley Branch Chair, Sally Ellis, said: “We had a fantastic range of entries for the awards this year and the judges’ task was incredibly difficult. What made the Kings Lock office extension stand out was high level of sustainability shown in this project by its extensive use of recycled materials, particularly the use of straw bales and car tyres. ICE believes that civil engineers are very much at the heart of our society, delivering sustainable development for the community and I think that the new Kings Lock office is an excellent example of why this is the case”.
Mark Rowe Upper Thames Manager from the Environment Agency said: “We’re delightedthis building has receivedan Engineering Excellence Award.It incorporates design and construction features which many would see as unconventional but I'm sure everyone will agree, it looks great! The passion and commitment of the staff at Kings Lock really helped to make this project happen and we hope it will lead to similar innovative projects on the River Thames."