As one of the oldest and most picturesque cities in Belgium, Bruges was the host to winter shopping and ice skating for locals and visitors to the city.
Stageco was brought in for the seventh consecutive year to create the framework and infrastructure for the city centre attraction. The Stageco team of four transported 80 tons of equipment to the site to build the 20m x 30m ice rink structure.
Tom Bilsen, project manager for Stageco comments, "The ice rink was a challenge due to the uneven ground level. Across the rink there was a difference of 1.5m in height which meant we had to design the structure to overcome this."
This year, Stageco also built 12 scaffolding towers surrounding the ice rick which were used for decoration; the entire build took one and a half days. Each 6m high tower was loaded with 2.4 tons counter weight to ensure the stability of the structure.
(Jim Evans)
