IStructE - Gold Medal Address 'Learnings from record bridges'

The Gold Medal is the Institution’s highest individual honour.

The 2026 Gold Medal has been awarded to Tina Vejrum, in recognition of her outstanding contribution to the design and delivery of major long-span bridges and complex infrastructure projects worldwide. She has provided significant contributions to landmark schemes as well as to concept development for floating cable-supported bridges, demonstrating exceptional expertise in bridge aerodynamics, wind engineering and structural behaviour. Through her leadership of multidisciplinary teams and her contribution to international committees and professional bodies, she has advanced engineering practice and influenced bridge design and delivery on a global scale.

Tina’s presentation Learnings from record bridges explores how landmark projects including the Great Belt Fixed Link in Denmark, the Stonecutters Bridge in Hong Kong and the 1915 Çanakkale Bridge in Turkey have driven advances in bridge engineering through challenging conditions such as extreme winds, powerful currents, heavy maritime traffic and deep-water construction.

Drawing on her long career with COWI, Tina will demonstrate how each record-breaking structure has built on the last in terms of technology and methods. She will then look ahead to the Ferry Free E39 project in Norway, where floating structures are being considered to support roadways across water depths of more than 500m. She will also reflect on the links between her career as a bridge engineer and her involvement in professional associations including IStructE and as IABSE President from 2022 to 2025.