Walter Sisulu Square of Dedication

Constructed on the center of the busiest traffic circle in Kliptown, this project had the goal of creating a complex feature entrance wall to a new National Monument in Soweto, South Africa.

The curved entrance panels were extremely complex and would have been virtually impossible to form accurately using conventional shuttering techniques for in-situ concrete walls and even more difficult to build using an in-situ structural frame with masonry infill. Tilt-Up also ensured a high degree of accuracy since it was possible to determine reference points for the panels in order to get the exact curvature of the panels.

This project presented several unique construction challenges. Since there was insufficient space to cast all the columns on the traffic circle, an area of vacant land was used as a casting bed. Site scaffolding was used to create casting platforms more than 2 meters in height, and all the columns were cast on these elevated platforms.

The entrance feature was comprised of two U-shaped walls that face each other. These walls were unique because the bottom of one was straight while the top was curved in and out and vice versa on the other wall. A flat lift with mid-air rotation was necessary because a conventional lift would have generated stress points on the panel. One crane was used to lift the panel horizontally and a second crane transferred the panel to an edge life during a mid-air transfer.