On June 19th, the Bridges and Pumping Stations of Noordwaard, designed by West 8 and ipv Delft, were awarded the Landezine International Landscape Award (Lila) in the category of Infrastructure.
LILA explains, ‘It is a bold but also humble design that respects the water landscape. The bridges have many different functions such as dikes, resting areas for birds, and introduce water in a spectacular way. They also facilitate public access and provide new opportunities for recreation in the de-poldered area. This is a clear statement that design matters because it adds value for people, birds, and water landscape.’
The Noordwaard Project, the largest of 39 sub-projects of the Netherlands’ national flood prevention program titled ‘Room for the River’, was a massive undertaking. The project involved more than four million cubic meters of earthworks; 50 structures were demolished and 30 kilometers of quays and dykes, 45 kilometers of creeks, 29 talluds, 33 bridges, 60 hydraulic structures and 12 pumping-stations were created. In collaboration with the competition winning implementation team (Boskalis, Martens en van Oord, van Hattem en Blankevoort, Gebr. van Kessel), West 8 (as architects) and IPV Delft designed 33 bridges (24 Creek Bridges, 6 Dike Bridges and 3 Steurgat Bridge) and 12 pumping-stations for the Noordwaard polder.
LILA was established in 2016 by Zaš Breza, editor-in-chief of Landezine, and Robert Schäfer, an independent journalist. The prestigious award aims to recognize interesting landscape architects and their projects from all over the world.
Project credits:
• Initiator: Rijkswaterstaat, Project Bureau Ontpoldering Noordwaard
• Planning Study: Project Bureau Ontpoldering Noordwaard
• Realization: Rijkswaterstaat, Project Bureau Ontpoldering Noordwaard
• Execution: Combination Noordwaard (Boskalis bv, Martens en Van Oort, Van Hattum en Blankevoort, Gebr. Van Kessel bv.) Architects involved are Ipv Delft and West 8
