Mayange-Nyamabare footbridge inauguration day (Rwanda, Gatsibo District)


Photo credit (above): Milosz Reterski


BUILDING TO INSPIRE: BRIDGES TO PROSPERITY


“Bridges can change lives,” Frantz describes. “T ey provide access to education, healthcare, sustainable resources, employment, and businesses, such as cash crops and commodity crops. T e bridges provide access to unlimited opportunity.” Helvetas’ cable suspended design, a system that had


been developed and implemented in Nepal for over 30 years, is the blueprint for B2P’s Suspended Bridge Manual, which provides a template-style overview of the strategy for designing, engineering, and building footbridges. Once funding and donors have been secured for a project, a plan is put into action that encompasses surveying bridge sites, obtaining domestic supplies, and, most importantly, delegating responsibilities— both during and after bridge construction. “B2P’s model is based on teaching people to build and maintain their bridges on the local level,” Bang says. “T ey are taught to make use of their local resources.” B2P empowers communities to form Bridge Committees, and makes the program available to local masons and engineers. T e strategy is then modifi ed to incorporate local construction techniques and alternative building materials. Builders include recruits from the country’s municipality, local labor, volunteer engineers, corporate volunteers, and University Chapter students.


22 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2012 WIRE ROPE EXCHANGE


Photo credits: Bridges to Prosperity A CLEAR PATH TO PROSPERITY


Once a bridge project is completed—a process that can take anywhere from a few months to a year, and can cost from $12,000 to $36,000 depending on location—the result is more than a secure structure that provides safe passage over impassable terrain. Bridges to Prosperity provides connection to a world of opportunity. With access to markets, food supplies, healthcare, and education, communities that once lived in rural isolation can grow and prosper. T e newfound availability of transportation introduces employment opportunities, exchange of resources, new roles for women in the community, and disease treatment and prevention. T e program has also helped to signifi cantly reduce poverty. T e amazing achievements, accomplishments, and success of B2P and its contributing partners were celebrated last July with the opening of the organization’s 100th bridge. “T ere were almost 2,000 people in attendance the day we celebrated the bridge opening in Rwanda,” Frantz recounts. “It was an unbelievable turnout.” To date, B2P has built 101 bridges in 16 diff erent countries…and counting. T e organization’s founder and volunteers hope to further extend the world of possibility to communities in need with additional support from interested companies, in the form of equipment, supplies, services, and funding. y


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84