As part of the festive annual celebration of the Siegen District Association of the Association of German Engineers (VDI), Mr. Jan-Hendrik Sidenstein was awarded the VDI Sponsorship Prize 2019 as the best graduate of the Master's degree course in Civil Engineering. His Master's thesis, written at the Chair of Concrete and Masonry Structures, is entitled "A contribution to the investigation of the suitability of different types of natural stone in the design of innovative HPC and UHPC systems". Further information

Environmental awareness, the consequences of climate change and the sustainable use of natural resources are more relevant than ever. Over the past decades, many construction measures have not been adapted to natural developments, but have in some cases been at odds with them.

Today, the focus is on: "Back to nature, building for the future in harmony with nature, city and landscape!". The "neo-ecology" trend describes the major social change process towards a resource-efficient, sustainable economy. The development of sustainable, nature-oriented solutions was therefore the theme of this year's Building Day.

Sustainability in cities and municipalities as well as environmental orientation were the focus of the first contributions to the 9th Siegen Building Day. The town of Bad Berleburg, which won the German Sustainability Award 2020 in the "Small Towns and Municipalities" category, is a prime example of this. This award recognizes cities that act as pioneers in municipal sustainability.

After the break, the presentations focused on renewable raw materials and gave examples of sustainable construction with wood. Highly topical issues at the moment are also nature-friendly coastal protection and nature-based solutions in hydraulic engineering.

The Siegen Construction Day is an event organized by the University of Siegen and supported by the Förderverein für Architektur und Bauingenieurwesen. Information on the 2019 Construction Day can be found at www.bautag.org .

At the invitation of Fertigbau Lindenberg OTTO QUAST GmbH & Co. KG around 20 students from the Solid Construction II and Bridge Construction courses visited the precast concrete plant in Freudenberg-Lindenberg on 26.06.2019 as part of an excursion. The managing director and plant manager, Mr. Andreas Schimanski, welcomed the participants and introduced them to the history and business areas of the company. Two graduates from the University of Siegen then gave a guided tour of the plant.

The tour continued from the mixing plant to the production of walls and ceiling panels, which are manufactured in a circulation system. Columns with molded foundations, TT slabs, reinforced concrete and prestressed concrete trusses as well as columns with brackets and various prefabricated reinforcement cages were on display in the external warehouse. Finally, the prestressing beds for the production of TT slabs and prestressed concrete trusses were inspected.

The picture on the left shows pre-stressed TT slabs as semi-finished parts. The right-hand picture shows the prefabricated reinforcement cage of a column with a molded foundation.

At the invitation of Straßen.NRW, South Westphalia regional branch, this year's bridge construction excursion took place on 05.06.2019. As in the 2018/2019 winter semester, the destination was the Rinsdorf and Rälsbach viaducts south of Siegen, which are being demolished and replaced by new structures as part of the A45 expansion project.

The existing Rinsdorf viaduct dates back to 1967 and only has one superstructure for both directions of travel. The students were informed in detail about the planned procedure for the replacement construction and the current status of the work. At present, the 485.5 m long superstructure of the northern section, which is to carry traffic in the direction of Dortmund in future, is being built next to the existing structure using the incremental launching method. The photo on the left shows the steel trough of the superstructure, designed as a steel composite structure, during the shifting process.

The photo on the right shows the current status of work on the future northern section of the Rälsbach viaduct. The superstructure is being built as a two-cell box girder cross-section in prestressed concrete construction in sections on stationary shoring.

With around 2,300 participants, "BetonTage" is the leading congress for the European precast concrete industry. The traditional event took place for the 63rd time this year. From February 19 to 21, 2019, everything revolved around concrete as a building material and the prefabrication of concrete components at the Edwin-Scharff-Haus congress center in Neu-Ulm.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Torsten Leutbecher and Prof. Dr.-Ing. Thorsten Weimar (Chair of Structural Engineering, University of Siegen) presented a composite-free concrete sandwich element with a glass facing shell developed in a joint research project on the panel "Potentials of tomorrow's concrete components". Further information

At the invitation of Straßen.NRW, South Westphalia regional branch, this year's bridge construction excursion to the Rinsdorf and Rälsbach viaducts south of Siegen took place on 23.11.2018. The existing structures are being demolished and replaced by new structures as part of the A45 expansion project.

The participants were informed in detail about the planning and execution of the structures under construction. While the demolition and replacement construction of the Rälsbach viaduct can be carried out separately for each directional lane, the new construction of the Rinsdorf viaduct requires special measures due to the one-piece superstructure. The future northern part of the structure (Dortmund direction) will be built next to the existing structure for the construction period and then - after demolition of the existing structure and construction of the southern part of the structure (Frankfurt direction) - moved into its final position, including the foundations and the approx. 70 m high piers.

The photo on the left shows the Rinsdorf viaduct to be replaced and the piers of the future northern section currently under construction. The photo on the right shows the existing southern structure of the Rälsbach viaduct and the current status of work on the abutments and piers of the future northern section.

The virtual planning of building structures is becoming increasingly efficient thanks to the use of Building Information Modeling (BIM) methodology. The focus here is on interdisciplinary collaboration between all those involved in the construction process with the aim of creating an integrated three-dimensional model that is consistently designed. Time and cost parameters are also to be included in order to achieve greater planning reliability.

This virtualization of construction processes permeates the entire construction industry, starting with the design process, the digital recording of our surroundings and the associated structural facilities, the infrastructure through to the structural implementation with all questions of detail, materials and costs.

Under the aspect of 'first virtual then real', an attempt is made to map all these issues virtually first.

This means a high level of planning expertise and, due to the necessarily distributed knowledge aspects, a higher level of cooperative collaboration.

Experts from research and practice provided insights into the digitalized construction industry at the eighth Siegen Construction Day.

The Siegen Construction Day is an event organized by the University of Siegen and supported by the Förderverein für Architektur und Bauingenieurwesen. Information on the 2018 Construction Day can be found at www.bautag.org .

The consequences of climate change are already being felt. Climate change affects all areas of life. But how does a changing climate affect construction in urban and rural areas? On November 10, 2017, stakeholders from the fields of research, teaching, politics and business explained and discussed their ideas and strategies on the possible consequences of climate change under the guiding theme of "Climate change: building in stormy times".

The Siegen Building Day is an event organized by the University of Siegen and supported by the Förderverein für Architektur und Bauingenieurwesen. Information on the 2017 Building Day can be found at www.bautag.org .

New large-scale applications, current technical developments, practical experience and standardization in the field of ultra-high performance concrete were the focus of the third international UHPFRC symposium - after 2009 and 2013 - which took place for the first time in Montpellier in southern France from 2 to 4 October 2017.

The Chair of Concrete Structures at the University of Siegen was represented at this conference with two contributions on the topics of "The German Guideline for ultra-high performance concrete" and "Effect of specimen size on the compressive strength of ultra-high performance concrete".

With over 1,000 participants, the 5th DAfStb Annual Conference and 58th Research Colloquium took place at the Technical University of Kaiserslautern on September 20 and 21, 2017. This year's motto was "Concrete - thinking ahead ...". The work of the German Committee for Reinforced Concrete and research activities at German universities in the fields of concrete technology and solid construction were reported on in numerous sessions and presentations.

As part of the research colloquium, Philipp Riedel from the Chair of Concrete and Masonry Structures at the University of Siegen presented the results of his research work. His paper "Experimental investigations into the shear load-bearing capacity of reinforced concrete components with low longitudinal reinforcement without shear reinforcement" was awarded the Best Paper Award.

This year's symposium of the Fédération internationale du béton(fib) took place from June 12 to 14 in Maastricht (Netherlands) under the title "High Tech Concrete - Where Technology and Engineering Meet". 625 participants from 43 countries were given an overview of the latest research results and developments in concrete construction in 340 presentations, as well as the opportunity for professional discussion.

Philipp Riedel represented the Chair of Concrete Structures at the University of Siegen with a presentation on "Shear Bearing Behavior of Slender Reinforced Concrete Members without Shear Reinforcement Containing a Low Ratio of Longitudinal Reinforcement".

This year's bridge construction excursion to the Hochmosel bridge near Zeltingen-Rachtig took place together with the Institute of Geotechnics on 07.06.2017(http://www.hochmoseluebergang.rlp.de). The participants were given comprehensive information about the overall Hochmosel crossing project as well as the planning and execution of the 1.7 km long bridge currently under construction. The photo shows the excursion participants on the steel superstructure of the Hochmosel bridge, which was built using the incremental launching method with auxiliary bracing.