1980s - unsw faculty of engineering · 136 the history of the unsw school of civil and...

134 THE HISTORY OF THE UNSW SCHOOL OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING 1949-2010

1980sCHAPTER 6 THE ‘80S- ‘A PERIOD OF CONTRACTION’

No one has ever entered academia for the money, and from the very beginning staff at UNSW had often sacrificed the chance of better remuneration ‘outside’ - in industry, commerce and the professions. Professor David Pilgrim recalled the legendary Joe Bourke, the university’s first Bursar, telling him in 1958 that he should gladly accept a pay cut from his previous industry salary for the privilege of working at the new university. One student recalled how Crawford Munro’s call for graduates to become involved in the excitements of the new Water Research Laboratory drew amused responses when he revealed how poor the wages actually were.1 For many staff, it was the intellectual delights and the freedoms of the scholar that were the currency of reward in a university life. Although there were some material benefits, especially in the earlier decades of the University, when staff were paid time and a half for teaching after six pm,2 the academic economy was, and still is, based not on money, but on love.

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1985 rainboW Warrior boMbed and Sunk by frenCh intelligenCe agentS©greenpeaCe

1986 ibM produCeS firSt laptop CoMputeruluru handed baCk to indigenouS oWnerS

1987 global StoCk Market CraSh©ap hiStory

1987 firSt Mobile phone Call Made in auStralia

1987 auStralian population 16.25 Million

1988auStralia’S biCentenary of european SettleMentroyal CoMMiSSion into aboriginal deathS in CuStody©Qld goVernMent

front of SChool, 1986CourteSy adrian bull

THE HISTORY OF THE UNSW SCHOOL OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING 1949-2010 135

But it was during the ‘80s that academic salaries really became adrift from those of the professional and commercial worlds, as the University and the School hit what the new VC Michael Birt mildly referred to as a ‘period of contraction’.3 It was in fact a crisis situation in funding for equipment and staff salaries.4 The early excitement of Federal government financial support had soon withered as the Commonwealth increasingly tightened its grip on both the money and the way the universities did business. A return of a federal Labour government in 1983 gave some staff cause for hope, but, ‘worse, not better was to come’.5

Staff numbers at the School were in free fall throughout the decade, which began with 60 academic staff employed, and ended with 43.6 The staff/student ratio obviously increased, from an – admittedly idyllic – 7.3 to 12.0 by the end of the decade, better than the university average of 14.07 simply because civil engineering student numbers had also declined. Overall UNSW did not grow its student population in the decade, partly because there was no financial incentive to do so. Eventually a 1986 government review would reveal that while student numbers nationally had swelled by a third, government funding, in real terms, had stayed static for ten years.8 Only at the end of the decade did Government begin to fund universities on the basis of student numbers, with the introduction of HECS in 1989.9 Ron Woodhead was Head of School from 1981–1984. Facing continuing and severe budgetary restrictions, he complained of ‘short-sighted policy on the part of our political decision makers’ and warned of the dangers to ‘the technical competence of the nation’.10

The undergraduate student population remained relatively stable, from 505 in 1979 to 472 in 1989. Stable, but low. The high enrolments of the ‘60s were now a distant memory, and civil engineering seemed to be a useful but not the most exciting of professions for school leavers to consider. Mobile phones may have cost hundreds of dollars, and personal computers only contained 64 kilobytes of memory11 but the ‘80s would see the rise and rise of the new technologies, and within the Faculty, the the newly renamed School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science was by now far and away the largest School in the Faculty.

There was one element of expansion for the School of Civil Engineering when the previously autonomous Graduate School of Transport and Highways entered the School in 1980 as the new Department of Transport Engineering with Professor Ross Blunden as Head. This move also brought in several new staff including John Black, Theo ten Brummelaar, Michael Dunne, Alec Fisher, Bob Jones and John Tindall. Brian Shackel joined his ex-colleagues from the Graduate School of Highway Engineering, John Cogill and Bill Yandell, in Ian Lee’s Department of Civil

The early excitement of Federal

government financial support

had soon withered as the

Commonwealth increasingly

tightened its grip on both

the money and the way the

universities did business. A

return of a federal Labour

government in 1983 gave

some staff cause for hope,

but, ‘worse, not better was to

come’.

1989 berlin Wall brought doWnCdS replaCe Vinyl reCordS©topneWS.in

1989 haWke goVernMent introduCeS heCS ©fairfax arChiVeS

1981 loweSt undergrad population - 449- Since early 1950S

1980 department of tranSport formed

1981 firSt woman pHd leone yandell graduateS

1987 centre for waStewater treatment founded

1987 auStralian rainfall & runoff publiSHedpublication of reinforced concrete by Hall, rangan & warner

1980s important school dates


Engineering Materials. While some in the new Transport Department felt their Golden Age was over,12 the group continued its teaching and research – including traffic flow theory, the lighting of traffic facilities and optimisation methods for land-use and transport analysis.13 When Blunden retired, John Black was appointed to the position of Head of Department in 1981 and three years later, in 1984, became the first Professor of Transport Engineering in Australia.14 In January 1983, an initiative by the Department of Transport Engineering was to design and conduct a three-week training course in Indonesia as part of the United Nations Development Program on Urban Highway Planning.15

Due to the freeze on most staff appointments, only a few staff joined the School in the early ‘80s. They included Tom Chapman, Max Irvine, Neil Mickleborough and Francis Tin Loi. Far more than that number left. It wasn’t just academic staff who were doing it tough. In a period of general unemployment as high as 10%, the early ‘80s saw job opportunities for civil engineers shrink. Woodhead was honest about the situation, writing to students in the 1983 Civil Engineering Yearbook, ‘I know that the current employment climate looks very bleak for you and will pose considerable challenges to your ingenuity and resourcefulness’.16

A School Report prepared for the VC in March 1983 gave Woodhead further opportunity to protest. In the Report, the School asserted its national and international reputation, and restated its aim to be the centre of excellence in civil engineering education and research, not just for Australia but for the Asia Pacific region. But there were obstacles to achieving this objective, and Woodhead’s 1983 list of blocks to progress makes familiar reading for today. He included ‘increased teaching load’, which must necessarily reduce ‘time spent on research, on developing innovations and other professional activities’; devolution of responsibilities without concomitant support; a ‘University accounting system slow to provide the information necessary for decision making’; and finally, numbers of professional and technical staff were ‘being reduced to such an extent that efficiency in teaching and research is reduced’.17

Increasingly, in an attempt to decrease their financial dependence on wilful governments, Schools adopted entrepreneurial behaviours. One way was through research centres, designed to attract non-government alliances and funding. UNSW had 19 Research Centres in 1984, 56 in 1988. ‘It was the old university of 1949 in new guise’, noted O’Farrell, ‘sponsorships, scholarships, out-working with other authorities and institutions’.18 Not quite the old university. No longer the ‘tight control from the top’ á la Baxter, VC Michael Birt instead allocated budgets to Faculty Deans, a decentralising move which had both advantages and difficulties, as the Deans now bore the brunt of Schools’ wrath.19

In 1986 the Centre for Waste Management was established, as a cross Faculty initiative, between the Schools of Civil Engineering and Applied Geology, with the School’s Associate Professor David Barnes as Director. Its aims were to provide postgraduate and industry education, facilitate multi-disciplinary research, and foster University industry liaison.20 In 1987

Increasingly, in an attempt

to decrease their financial

dependence on wilful

governments, Schools adopted

entrepreneurial behaviours.

One way was through research

centres, designed to attract

non-government alliances and

funding.

induStry-SChool innoVatiVe reSearCh Collaboration 1984Stephen jones from austgen-biojet and associate professor david barnes in front of pilot model plant of anaerobic fluidized bed, a method of purifying high strength wastewaters.

piCture keVin doig, uniken, CourteSy unSW arChiVeS.


Government funding was also obtained for the new Centre for Wastewater Treatment Processes, based in the public health engineering group within the Department of Water Engineering. Its Director was also Associate Professor David Barnes. Unfortunately Barnes resigned the following year, to carve out a very successful career in industry. A further Centre was for Groundwater Management and Hydrogeology, involving collaboration between the Schools of Civil Engineering and Applied Geology, with the School’s Colin Dudgeon as Deputy Director, and Michael Knight from Applied Geology as Director.21

Devolution also meant more work for the School administration. School Office staff co-ordinated and processed the enrolment, examination and records of hundreds of School students, as well as being responsible for timetabling, classroom allocation, financial records, and upkeep and maintenance of subject profiles, staff publication records, and School equipment catalogues. The School Senior Administrative Officer, Bob Prior, had embraced the administrative changes wrought by the new technologies and computer programs were produced for School timetabling, teaching loads and room bookings.22 Still, on occasion it was all too much. In 1982 Prior commented wryly that ‘perhaps the Executive Assistant, Dr David Robinson, and the Clerk, George Harris, have suffered a little from handling some 1000 variations of enrolment’,23 and felt that on such testing occasions ‘George can be excused for donning his caftan and posting another succinct notice on the board’.24

The School, like other engineering Schools, worked with the UNIX operating system, tended by Angela Spano. Prior noted that as well as her secretarial and computer duties, Angie provided ‘most of our wisdom and judgement’.25 Other 1980’s administrative staff included Ray Martin, Stores

CiVil engineering yearbook 1983Students gently mock complexities of student enrolment procedures – pre online systems


Officer and ex-RAAF Cec Murphy as School Clerk. Prior hoped that Cec’s military background might assist the School Office’s ‘chances of winning arguments on students’ exemptions’. Sue Hopkins was secretary to the self-funding Centre for Postgraduate Studies in Civil Engineering (CPGS), assisting academic staff in running special courses. Later this role would be undertaken by Shirley Webster.

In the early and mid ‘80s the School still employed a large number of technical staff in its laboratories and in the Civil Workshop. The workshop laboratory craftsmen, including Ray Ferguson, Brian Horsell, Joe Mifsud and Wadie Rofail were ‘an imaginative, inventive band of artisans headed by “the laird” Bob Falconer’, and as Prior noted, ‘their skills contribute greatly to the research and teaching efforts in the School – and their party organising ability is unmatched’.26

It was still an era of gendered division of labour, of the academic master and secretarial handmaid. As Tom Chapman recalled, the School was organised into five departments, ‘each of which was headed by a professor, and acted as a little fiefdom, occupying one floor of the building. Each Department had a typist, who acted as the Head of Department’s secretary, and theoretically was available to undertake typing for the other academics in the Department. She had what was usually the only computer terminal on the floor’.27 Departmental secretaries during this period included Eileen Caterson, Mary Draku, D Farmakis, Betty Hegh, Jan Hutchinson, Nurit Korn, Venus Kringas, Patricia McLaughlin, Julie O’Keefe, Ruth Rogan, Lynda Saville and Gwenda Taylor. As the 1986 Yearbook noted, the secretaries took ‘an interest in the wellbeing of the department’s staff and students’.28

Female student participation in the School’s undergraduate and postgraduate degrees finally rose through the ‘80s from 1.5% in 1979 to 8% of total enrolments in 1989, respectable within the Faculty’s overall rate of 9.5%, but which in its turn was well beneath UNSW’s 41%.29

It wasn’t just girls who appeared uninterested in civil – and other – engineering knowledge, and shrinking work opportunities. Following the free fall of the ‘70s, the School’s undergraduate population remained static. In 1987, however, first-year intake had been so low, dropping to 88 students - when it had averaged 135 for the previous ten years30 – that the following year the School lowered the HSC entry mark to 284 (the fortieth percentile) in order to revive the numbers. The BE’s lack of popularity hadn’t made the course content any easier, however, and when students struggle, teaching staff must also. The experiment was not repeated, and the HSC cut-off was restored to 338 (the twentieth percentile) in 1989 which, as the new HoS Robin Fell noted, was ‘ a more realistic level given the demands of the course’.31

The common Faculty first-year had come adrift by the late ‘70s, as Schools reasserted their own specific nature and needs.32 In 1983 Woodhead had begun a comprehensive curriculum review33and, after much discussion and debate, the resulting changes were implemented in 1985 and 1986 by Woodhead’s successor Professor Tom Chapman,

departMental SeCretarieS ‘80Sfrom l-r (top to bottom): betty hegh, nurit korn, Venus kringas, ruth rogan, lynda Saville and gwenda taylorCourteSy SChool arChiVeS

It was still an era of

gendered division of labour,

of the academic master and

secretarial handmaid ... each

of which [department] was

headed by a professor, and

acted as a little fiefdom ...


not without some ‘anticipated trauma’.34 New first-year courses were introduced, including Civil Engineering Practice, while fourth year students were now offered majors in any two of the five disciplinary areas offered by the School, ‘to specialize and develop professional skills and understanding’.35 However, despite all the efforts and negotiations, the new curriculum proved ‘somewhat fragmented and with too many small subjects, which were difficult to coordinate’.36 With 58 subjects in the new revised BE course students were overburdened with examinations, which further diminished their chances of completion within the optimum four years.37 In 1987, therefore, the BE was revised again.

Working through a maze of requirements and the chronically heavy workload of an engineering degree, students built their own supportive networks and communities. CIVSOC also hosted a variety of communal events, most with the requisite alcohol, and from 1982 to 1990 produced – with help from School administrative staff – lively and irreverent Yearbooks. In them students boldly rated courses and lecturers with varying degrees of affection and retribution, a critique to which academic staff responded mainly with grace, but sometimes with righteous indignation.38

A recurring favourite was the construction camp, a week long event usually held on UNSW land at Fowlers Gap, 130 kilometres north of Broken Hill. Construction management lecturer Vic Summersby enjoyed witnessing the emerging talents of students, and their ability to problem solve and innovate under duress. Another highlight for him was introducing overseas students – and some Sydney citizens – ‘to the Australian outback and to fauna they had never seen in the wild, eg kangaroos, wild goats, camels, emus and a horse that walked into and drank beer at the bar of the Silverton hotel’.39

While many staff, especially senior staff, still wore suits or at least shirts and ties to work, photos of the day showed very few students doing the same. The attire was determinedly casual, egalitarian, the cult of Aussie bloke-dom. There was even a CIVSOC suggestion – it would have been blasphemous in Crawford Munro’s day – that the Munro Cup be changed from rugby union to soccer ‘to increase student participation’.40 The Cup eventually became touch football. If they remained anti-elite, they also still remained determinedly masculinist. The 1983 CIVSOC committee produced ‘pale pink short sleeved sloppy joes’ with the slogan, ‘civil engineers are REAL men’ on the back of them. Another slogan considered was ‘civil engineers are the erection specialists’.41 Civil students were not unaware of public perception of them; in fact they said they wanted, through the proposed colour schemes, to ‘change the image of civil engineers from dull, dreary yobbos to one of dull colourful yobbos’.42

Whatever about the unreconstructed students, the School was moving forward on gender issues. Head of School Tom Chapman oversaw not only the integration of a complex curriculum change but also the conversion of the first floor toilets into women’s toilets. There was also the appointment of Penny Fitzgerald – in 1986 she became the first woman lecturer at the School. Penny taught public health engineering, having had

In the early and mid ‘80s the

School still employed a large

number of technical staff in

its laboratories and in the

Civil Workshop. The workshop

laboratory craftsmen, including

Ray Ferguson, Brian Horsell,

Joe Mifsud and Wadie Rofail

were ‘an imaginative, inventive

band of artisans headed by

“the laird” Bob Falconer’,

and as Prior noted, ‘their

skills contribute greatly to

the research and teaching

efforts in the School – and

their party organising ability is

unmatched’.

1988 proeSSional and teChniCal Staff With hoS and ea


several years’ experience in the water treatment industry. Tom Chapman also oversaw the construction of a new computer laboratory, on the ground floor. He recalled, ‘I remember early in 1986 seeing Robert Hegedus [then School Analyst Programmer] and his staff wiring up the new computer terminals, and feeling a great sense that we were finally moving into the computer age’.43

The School was also moving forward on environmental issues. In 1989, under the leadership of Professor Max Irvine (HoS 1987–1989) the School introduced a new compulsory undergraduate course on engineering and the environment, reflecting the School and the profession’s ‘increasing awareness of its interaction with the physical and socio-political environment’.44 Max Irvine’s focus was also on developing links with Asia. He had been working with John Black for some years on the recruitment and training of international students and engineers, mainly from China and Indonesia. Due to their efforts, in 1983 the entrepreneurial School had the second of only two faxes in UNSW; the VC Michael Birt had the only other one. In the mid ’80s the School continued to engage more actively with Asia, establishing a variety of educational collaborations. Notable among these were the Rural Roads Programs and the Bridge Engineering Courses, run in both Indonesia and Australia for mid-career Indonesian engineers.

Over the ‘80s, enrolments in the MEngSc programs remained robust, averaging over 200 students per year, and the postgraduate coursework courses continued as one of the brightest jewels in Civil Engineering’s crown. Apart from subjects in the Graduate Course in Hydrology, postgraduate subjects were offered in the evenings, from 6 to 9 pm.45 Indeed the large numbers of postgraduate students within the

re-ConStruCtion CaMp 1988historic darlington point bridge being repositioned for rewelding by engineering construction and management students

photo SVetlana boziC, CourteSy unSW arChiVeS.


School – and the Faculty – were what enabled the Faculty of Engineering to hold its pre-eminent place within UNSW for overall student numbers and which made UNSW itself the largest national provider of postgraduate coursework degrees.46

The numbers of MEs and PhDs being undertaken at the School declined, however, over the decade, from 19 and 48 respectively enrolled in 1979 to 14 and 30 in 1989.47 One reason was the gap between Commonwealth scholarships – in 1981 approximately $4,600 – and the starting salary for engineers of approximately $14,000; acknowledged by the Dean of Engineering, Noel Svensson as a ‘gross disparity’,48 – a disparity which remains a vexing issue to this day. Nevertheless, regardless of the quantity, the quality of School postgraduate researchers was very high. A snapshot of the small 1989 PhD cohort shows the presence of future School and industry luminaries, including Jeffrey Min–Hsin Chen, Gareth Swarbrick, and three future professors – Stephen Foster, Nasser Khalili, and Ron Wakefield.

For as usual, despite all the constraints, difficulties and laments, the mighty work of the School continued. Research projects listed in the mid ‘80s included a major study of pavement management systems, major analysis on surface subsidence, improvements to the deposited properties of mine tailings, numerical analysis of geotechnical problems, design of construction operations, automated data gathering, computer simulation, and advanced construction robotics. There was research in reinforced and prestressed concrete, elastic stability, plasticity, numerical techniques and design studies in bridges, cable structures and membrane structures; and research in water and wastewater treatment, including sedimentation, biological nitrogen and phosphorus control, anaerobic fluidized bed treatment, encapsulation of intractable wastes, and studies of stream and estuarine pollution. There were studies on rainfall-runoff relationships, flood estimation and modelling, flood hazard mitigation and flood-plain management, water resources system planning and management, stochastic hydrology, and subsurface hydraulics and hydrology.49

In 1989 the School received an IEAust Excellence Award for its industry publication, Australian Rainfall and Runoff, the industry guide to flood estimation practice. The text has been used extensively by water industry professionals ever since, and has had the greatest widespread impact on water engineering of any book authored by Australians.50

By the mid to late ‘80s many of the School’s ‘50s and ‘60s pioneers had retired, including Ron Woodhead, whose Headship in 1984 had ended some months earlier than planned due to suffering a badly broken leg in a pedestrian accident on High St. Gone were major contributors to teaching, research and early School spirit such as Jim Antill, Peter Balint, Joe Brettle, Arthur Douglas, Ken Faulkes, Doug Foster, Bernie Gould, Al Kabaila, Bob Learmonth, Alan Nettleton, Laurie O’Neill, Rupert Traill-Nash and Geoffrey Welch.

Although he had not been at the School for some years, Rupert Vallentine’s departure from UNSW campus in 1982 from his position as Pro

...in 1983 the entrepreneurial

School had the second of only

two faxes in UNSW; the VC

Michael Birt had the only other

one.

graduate student brian Wallace and dr david Wilkinson using camera and tracking device to study underwater waves. 1981photo keVin doig, uniken, CourteSy unSW arChiVeS.


Vice-Chancellor was also a loss. Ian Lee had left to take up a position as the first Professor of Civil Engineering at the Australian Defence Force Academy in 1985. Weeks White and Stephen Yeomans also moved to Canberra at the same time.51 Tom Chapman noted that after Lee’s departure the School ‘was fortunate that we were able to appoint Robin Fell as a Visiting Professor for three years. Eyebrows were raised when we gave a Visiting Professor the authority of a Head of Department, but events proved this to be an outstanding success’.52 In 1988 Civil Engineering Materials renamed itself the Department of Geotechnical Engineering, to better reflect its actual research and teaching focus. Other losses in the late ‘80s included Tom Chapman, John Cogill, David Cook, Graham Easton, Owen Ingles and Vijaya Rangan. Rangan had been Head of the Department of Structural Engineering and left to take up a position as Professor and Head of Civil Engineering at Curtin University of Technology – later the Dean. In many ways he was sorry to go, to leave behind the close friendships developed with ‘the many colourful and wonderful people in the School’ but UNSW at the time lacked clear processes of career development and progression. To move forward to Professorial status, he felt he had to leave.53 Bob Prior, Senior Administrative Officer (SAO) since 1977, retired in 1989, as did Keith Watson, a member of the founding brotherhood. He had been with the School since 1951.

There were new leaders. By the late ‘80s Professors John Black, David Carmichael, Robin Fell, Max Irvine, and David Pilgrim now headed the Departments of Transport Engineering, Engineering Construction and Management, Geotechnical Engineering, Structural Engineering and Water Engineering respectively. In 1986 Dr Mark Bradford, who would become one of the School’s greatest research success stories, joined the

tranSport leCturer john tindall uSing VideoS at poStgraduate tranSport planning CourSe, 1983Students arthur boyd (nz), ranjit Mendis (Sri lanka) and norliah Saidin (Malaysia)

CourteSy unSW arChiVeS.


Department of Structural Engineering. David Pilgrim was the second staff member to be awarded a DSc – his was in 1984 on the basis of published papers in the field of flood hydrology and the modelling of runoff. There were some other important staff gains as well, many of whom would prove to inspire a new generation of students. Jim Ball, Garry Mostyn, Viriyawan Murti, George Nawar, Upali Vandebona and Ron Wakefield all joined the School in this period.

In economically pressing times, many staff and the Water Research Laboratory (WRL), of course, were encouraged to raise extra non-government funds through consulting work. In 1986 the School reported it had earned $128,000 from its own ‘extracurricular activities’ such as ‘continuing education courses, teaching assistance to the Mitchell College of Advanced Education and Unisearch consulting work’. Two thirds of the money raised went to pay staff wages.54 In 1987, with the support of HOS Max Irvine, Ron Cox established the Australian Water and Coastal Studies Pty Limited (AWACS), a joint venture between the NSW Public Works & Services Department and UNSW’s own consulting company, Unisearch Ltd. AWACS effectively combined the skills, expertise and resources of the PW&SD’s Manly Hydraulics Laboratory and the School’s WRL to provide water and coastal engineering solutions to governments and industry Australia wide and internationally, especially in SE Asia. AWACS turnover increased to more than $3 million per year within three years, and epitomised the School’s innovative abilities in outreach, professional and community service.55

To raise more funds, the Faculty of Engineering also actively pursued the recruitment of international students.56 In 1979 10% of engineering students were international students. By 1989 the figure was an impressive 22%, compared to an overall UNSW figure of 12.6%57 In that year the Dean of Engineering, Professor Chris Fell, established an International Committee, with the School’s Ian Gilbert as chairman and with representation from each of the Schools in the Faculty of Engineering. Civil Engineering’s representative was Brian Shackel. The Committee was charged with the responsibility of developing strategies for the recruitment of full-fee-paying international students to ensure that the Faculty’s income did not suffer when the Government removed its subsidy for overseas students in 1990. In the early stage this committee produced posters and handouts especially designed to attract the attention of prospective international students and made numerous overseas trips to Asia to establish the pathways for overseas students to follow. The outcomes of the work of this committee and UNSW’s International Office over a 10 year period placed the Faculty of Engineering and the School as leaders in international student recruitment.58

During Max Irvine’s tenure as Head of School, the School’s Centre for Postgraduate Studies in Civil Engineering was established, with a small grant of $44,000 from the University enabling the refurbishment of two lecture rooms, for the purpose of providing short courses for industry. Liza Lim was the Centre’s Administrator. The Centre’s work complemented

CiVSoC aSian bbQ, 1983CourteSy SChool arChiVeS.


the MEngSc program, offering courses that were specifically tailored to industry current needs, often involving outside academic and industry experts, and generally of much shorter duration. The Centre was also expected to make a profit from its operations, and to return its surplus to the School.59

Through international student recruitment, continuing education for industry, fundraising for scholarships and a proliferation of research centres, the canny School – and the University – had found a way to attract government and non-government funding, and to keep some control of the purse strings. If the decade had been at least initially one of ‘contraction’, as the VC Michael Birt had noted, the indomitable School of Civil Engineering had continued with its masterful problem-solving capacities and by the very end of the decade, under Professor Robin Fell’s new and determined leadership, it certainly had its eye on an expansive and more varied future.

Robin Fell re-strengthened connections with industry through the establishment of a twenty-member School visiting committee in late 1989 – made up of senior engineers from both the public and private arenas. Three sub-committees focused on three tasks: to review the undergraduate program as it was within the context of future needs; to review the continuing education and postgraduate courses, as well as research output and directions; and to attract ‘better qualified and motivated students’, promote the School with industry, and to find funding for research and development.

In the late ‘80s the Federal Government had introduced a ‘Relative Funding Model’ for universities. Faculty Dean Professor Chris Fell recalled that under this new model ‘it was noted that the Schools of Civil Engineering and Mechanical and Industrial Engineering were receiving more than their share of available funds, so an equitable funding model was developed with the Heads of Schools. This meant a lot of pain for some, Civil Engineering in particular’. One solution, he noted, was that ‘retiring general staff were not replaced’.60 Indeed, technical staff numbers overall at the School were halved in just six years – from 47 in 1986 to 23 in 1991.61

For if the IT world was expanding, the older traditions of craft – the ‘mechanical arts’ were in decline. The Civil Engineering workshop which had provided technical support to academic staff, researchers and

Vallentine annexeStruCtural teSting laboratory late 70SCourteSy SChool arChiVeS


students for decades was closed down – with the loss of 6 staff positions – not without considerable heartache. Robin Fell noted that they ‘were the first redundancies at UNSW and were poorly handled as a result’.62 Bob Falconer, the workshop ‘laird’ who had served the School for over twenty years with humour and inventiveness was at least spared the indignity of a forced redundancy. He had already retired in 1987.63

The end of the decade also saw the beginning of a major upgrading of computer facilities, involving expenditure of over half a million dollars in purchasing 22 Apollo work stations with a central file server. The School aimed to build up to 30 workstations, phasing out the VAX terminal labs, and providing students with opportunity to learn CAD techniques from their first year on.64 One-third of funding came from the School’s own ‘special funds’. The School had experienced some tough lessons about financial dependency on others, and was learning to fend – at least partially – for itself. Salary supplementation – for academics only- was also introduced by Robin Fell in the late ‘80s.

Also by 1989 the ever resourceful School was planning a new combined Civil Engineering/Law degree (first enrolments began in 1990), had rolled out a new inter-disciplinary Masters in Construction Management, begun internal courses in communication for its taciturn undergraduates and, most importantly, was about to embark on its new and brilliant gender-bending environmental career.

Wrl reSearChderek haradasa explaining Wrl research investigations into eraring power Station’s cooling tower to Marshall hughes and doug Clarke of Water resources Commission. 1984piCture keVin doig, CourteSy unSW arChiVeS.


‘80S HEADS OF SCHOOL

PROFESSOR RON WOODHEAD,1981–1984BE (Civil) Sydney ‘51; ME UNSW ‘57

Ron Woodhead, the eldest of three boys, grew up in Burwood, Sydney, in a ‘typical working class family’ of Yorkshire and Scottish descent. His father Eric was a compositor who worked for Bushells. Ron won a prize in mathematics at Burwood Public School and it was recommended that he go onto Sydney Technical High School. He was however not gifted with the practical arts, metalwork or woodwork – at chemistry classes he burnt the bottoms of test tubes – so he aimed at becoming a technical draftsman. He did recall however that ‘Later, many years later, when I was at the University of Technology at Mews Street under Dr Tenikes, I made a reflective mirror for a telescope, so I do claim eventually some expertise!’1

Ron enlisted in the Army just after he turned eighteen in early 1945, becoming a sapper in the Royal Australian Engineers and was involved in immediate post-War reconstruction efforts. He worked in Singapore and Japan, and in early 1946 saw at first hand the devastation of Hiroshima. A skirmish with TB brought him home in a hospital ship and in 1947 under the Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme, he won a place in the BE (Civil) at Sydney University, initially with the idea of becoming a surveyor.

After graduating in 1951, Ron worked for the Water Conservation and Irrigation Commission (WCIC) because he thought water might be the key area for a design engineer. But ‘then I found that I was going to be designing the same dam over and over again,’ so he went to work instead for leading consulting engineers Gutteridge Haskins & Davey (GHD). He was attracted to Stan Hall’s very first postgraduate courses on structural analysis and design being held at the new School of Civil Engineering at Ultimo. It was a revelation. ‘Here I was meeting people who were giving me the theory on problems that I was meeting in practice, to which the practitioners didn’t have the answers’. The ethos of the new university impressed him. It was a university, he felt, ‘based on ‘let’s learn how to do it approach’, an approach which very much suited his own intellectually open and questioning nature.

With a little encouragement from his wife, he applied for and attained a lectureship in structural engineering at the expanding School in 1953. There he began his early exploration of the use of computers for engineering research and practice, teaching computer techniques and numerical methods. He worked with Stan Hall, providing the computer analysis for the first application of matrix methods to structural analysis which resulted in their joint publication in 1961 of the innovative text Frame Analysis.

Later he collaborated with Jim Antill in another groundbreaking text, Critical Path Methods in Construction Practice. Very supportive of the


humanities component of the engineering degrees of UNSW, Woodhead also set up, with colleague Lloyd Edwards, the Great Books Club at the university, where staff met regularly for decades to read and discuss the classics of Western literature. He, like the university, was interested in producing well rounded graduates, ones who ‘not only knew theory but also knew practice, and also knew how to embed it in the culture’.

A period on sabbatical at the University of Illinois in 1966 led eventually to a full Professorship in Civil Engineering there from 1968 to 1973, before returning to UNSW to take up the position of Professor of Civil Engineering and Head of the new Department of Engineering Construction and Management. The initial offer from UNSW had been to teach systems theory, but Woodhead had learned that ‘systems by themselves don’t work unless they are tied to an object, [there needs to be] a practical application of systems’. Woodhead always taught students, in America and Australia, to tackle problems ‘the right way round’. That is, don’t ‘throw the theory at the problem. Observe the problem first, what sort of theory does it need?’ It was during his leadership of the new department that the very popular and memorable construction camps were instigated, an achievement which gave him great personal and professional satisfaction.

As Head of School, Woodhead was hampered by severe Government budgetary constraints inflicted upon the entire tertiary sector which prevented any major refurbishment of laboratory equipment or replacement of retiring staff. Woodhead warned about the ‘shortsighted policy on the part of our political decision makers’, which would have long lasting and serious implications for ‘the technical competence of the nation’.2 Despite these difficult constraints, he did however oversee a major review of the undergraduate curriculum, and encouraged the revival of the student organization CIVSOC, providing students with their own common room, Room 609. Students were appreciative, and Woodhead was affirmed in his belief that ‘if students are treated as professionals they will act as professionals’.3

His last weeks as Head of School were marred by a broken leg from a pedestrian accident in Kingsford, and Ron spent several weeks in the Prince of Wales Hospital, where he conducted tutorials with senior students. Professor Tom Chapman took on the role as Head of School some weeks earlier than expected.

Ron Woodhead retired in 1987. Looking back on his creative, innovative, dynamic and productive career he recalled:

‘I came to the University when it was clearly in its birth stages, when it was clearly the underdog, you might say. By the process of action and interaction of the staff, we transformed it into the leading university in this country. I have to thank all the people who I met, many now dead, who provided the truly university environment that is related to friendship and interchange of views, rather than positions held. That, I think, is the greatest thing I have to thank the School and the University for’.4


PROFESSOR TOM CHAPMAN, 1985–1987BSc (Civil Engineering) Leeds; PhD Southamptom, 1958

Tom Chapman was born in Shanghai but spent most of his childhood on the Channel Island of Jersey where he was a schoolboy during the German occupation. At the end of World War II he studied civil engineering at Leeds University. Unimpressed by the English climate (‘I had an attic room in Leeds with a skylight, through which no actual light penetrated for six weeks because it remained covered in snow’) he headed for Australia, working for five years on a variety of civil engineering projects, mainly for Government departments. He ventured back to England to take a PhD in groundwater hydraulics at Southampton University, then returned to Australia to work for 13 years with the CSIRO Division of Land Research in Canberra.5

In 1970 he was approached by Crawford Munro, who had been on a one year secondment to the UNSW Faculty of Military Studies in Duntroon, and encouraged to apply – successfully – for the Chair of Engineering at Duntroon. He taught there for ten years. In 1980 the Chair of Water Engineering at the School was advertised, and he sought the opportunity to join ‘this large group of academic water engineers, with whom I had enjoyed professional contacts for many years’. He took up the position as Head of the Department of Water Engineering in April 1981,6 replacing Rupert Vallentine. As Tom recalled about the School environment in the mid ‘80s:

‘Most academic staff were active in research on an individual basis, and supervised students who mostly held Commonwealth scholarships, but because of the lack of funds, most research projects were quite restricted. The School was organised into five departments, each of which was headed by a professor. The Head of School had less direct authority than is now the case, as each Department Head had control over a budget, which was negotiated at the beginning of each year. Management was achieved by a monthly meeting of Heads of Departments with the Head of School. Following representations from staff, the agenda and minutes of these meetings were posted in the School office. This was our first step towards transparency’.

Further steps were being taken to bring the School more up to date with the rise of the new technologies. As Tom recalled: ‘Introduction of the computing subject into first-year required a major upgrade of the School’s computer (from PDP8 to PDP11), and construction of a computer laboratory, which was on the ground floor. The operating system was Unix (of course) and the high level language taught was Pascal, which was not very popular, as it did not reflect industry practice’.

Progress in another area was slower. ‘The first female undergraduate student enrolled in the ‘70s but the School failed (possibly because we made little effort) to attract more than about 5% females, who generally did not fare well academically, perhaps because of their isolation. In my time, there were two active female students who lobbied on behalf of the


group, and they succeeded in having the first floor toilets converted for female use. Previous to this, the only female toilets available to students were on the lower ground floor. These were considered unsafe at night’.

During his term Tom also actively supported the student body CIVSOC with their social events and with the publication of the Yearbook. He praised them in 1986 for continuing ‘to be an example to other Schools of what an active student society can achieve’.7 He also was a strong proponent of community building for the School staff, and recalled a more collegial era. ‘Many staff were members of the University Club, located in the electrical engineering building, and had lunch there daily. The School usually had a table at special events, such as wine tastings, jazz lunches and the Christmas lunch. George Harris [Administrative Assistant] in the early ‘80s frequently invited colleagues for a few drinks in the School office after work on Fridays. When I became Head of School, Ian Somervaille and I used to travel to Randwick on Friday afternoon to purchase cask wine, orange juice and snacks, which were available in Room 601 to any staff member prepared to make a contribution of $1. This activity became known as the 1630 club’.

Professor Chapman retired in 1987. As his successor, Professor Max Irvine noted at the time, ‘Tom’s concern for students was well known and his efficient administration of school affairs and wise counsel on many matters are features that staff and students alike are indebted to him for’.8

PROFESSOR H MAx IRVINE, 1987–1989ME Cant.’70; CE Caltech.’74; PhD Auck.’77

Max Irvine, a New Zealander, came to the School from the United States, from MIT, in 1982 to take up the position of Head of the Structural Engineering Department. He was expert in the areas of cable structures, and had worked on the design of Istanbul’s famous First Bosporus Bridge. While Head of Department he published several important papers on structural dynamics and plastic design. When he became Head of School on July 1 1987, Vijay Rangan exclaimed, ‘a Structures man at the helm after more than ten years!’10 Upon his promotion Max managed to entice departmental secretary Ruth Rogan out of her short-lived retirement to help ‘the new Head of School sort out some of the paper work that he used to be able to dodge’.11

In his two years as Head of School, Max initiated or supported a number of positive changes. He set up a curriculum development committee to investigate desired changes to the undergraduate curriculum including the re-introduction of year-by-year progression, rather than subject-by-subject. In doing so, the number of subjects was reduced from 58 to 41. More emphasis was placed on the fourth year project/thesis, and a new 56-hour subject was introduced, a fitting sign of the times: ‘Engineers and the Environment’.12


Max also introduced Year Management committees of academic staff, to provide more consistent treatment in enrolments, special consideration, variations of enrolment as well as scheduling of tests and assignments over the year. Another development was the participation of the School in the new UNSW Co-op Education Program in 1989, whereby high achieving secondary school students received industry sponsored scholarships, and undertook significant industrial experience with the sponsoring organizations.

1988 also saw a review of the School’s curriculum and facilities by IE Aust, which once again affirmed the School’s accreditation. Max reported that the Review Panel was impressed with the course, as would be expected of a School which offered ‘the broadest, the best thought-out and I would hope, the best delivered undergraduate programme in Civil Engineering in this country’.13 Moreover Max appreciated that he was working for and with ‘the best university in Australia, the result of the efforts of hundreds of staff over the previous decade and more’.

Max upset CIVSOC by reappropriating the student common room 609 for a new computer lab for undergraduate students, but the march of the computers was irrevocable and, as CIVSOC admitted, essential. With the teaching of CAD and other software programs, School investment in computer facilities would cost over half a million dollars, with over two thirds of funds generated from School enterprises.14 By 1989 the School noted expenditure of $520,000 ‘to date’ with further computer purchasing still planned. $200,000 had been provided from a major equipment grant from UNSW but the rest of the money came from School funds including $170,000 generated from ‘continuing education, consulting and full-fee paying students’.15

It was a time of increasing entrepreneurial activities throughout the University as academic staff accepted that governments would continue to starve them of funds, and that any attempt at growth and expansion was up to them. The School was involved in the new Research Centres for Waste Management and for Wastewater Treatment Processes – these were run on commercial lines and expected to become profitable. It was a period which suited the dynamic and youthful new Head, and he and Professor John Black also developed the full fee-paying Bridge Engineering Course for Indonesian engineers. Max recalled his work with Indonesia over nearly 20 years, ‘during which time the School of Civil Engineering had literally hundreds of mid-career engineers from the Indonesia Departments of Public Works and Home Affairs doing short courses and/or Masters. A couple are now cabinet ministers. This link in its size, breadth and longevity must be close to unique’.

Max also instigated staff seminars on a regular basis, one per year per staff, interspersed with lunchtime talks from leaders in industry and the profession.16 His focus on was keeping closer links with the profession, in raising funds for growth, in developing links with Asia, and in making sure the School maintained its premier position as the national civil engineering educator, for undergraduates, postgraduates and industry professionals.


Australian Rainfall and Runoff The major achievement of the School’s

hydrology group was the production of the third

edition of Australian Rainfall and Runoff between 1982

and 1987. This is the guide to flood estimation practice

published by The Institution of Engineers Australia.

It could be said that this work has had the greatest

widespread impact on water engineering in Australia

of any book authored by Australians. It is regarded

as authoritative by all involved professionally and by

the courts, and covers design of structures ranging

from gutter inlets through culverts and bridges to

the spillways of major dams. The average annual

expenditure for the whole of Australia on works sized

by the flood estimates was at the time approximately

$1,200 million or 0.3% of the nation’s gross domestic

product, and average annual damages from riverine

and urban flooding each approximate a further $500

million. Two previous editions of Australian Rainfall

and Runoff were published in 1958 and 1977. The first

edition (1958) was coordinated by Crawford Munro and

largely produced by members of the School staff and

was one of the first attempts to produce a nationwide

design manual, but suffered from a lack of available

field data.

In 1982 The Institution of Engineers Australia

requested Professor Pilgrim to lead a team from the

School of Civil Engineering to completely revise

and rewrite the document. This involved a five-year

project, with extensive interaction with the profession

throughout Australia and other interested groups

including the Australian National Committee on

Large Dams, the Australian Road Research Board,

and the National Association of Australian State Road

Authorities. Workshops arranged by the Institution

were conducted at ten centres around Australia to

provide interaction with the profession.

Leading the revision involved not only

development of procedures, selection of design

methods and data, and writing of much of the

document, but also the organisation and co-ordination

of the whole project. This included development of

design rainfall data for Australia by the Bureau of

Meteorology, involving work to the value of about $2

million, and derivation of flood

design data by Government

authorities in most States. The

School received a grant of

$40,000 to employ a part-time

typist and a research student.

The overall project involved work to the value of about

$4 million (1987 costs). School staff involved were

Professor David Pilgrim, Assoc Professor Ian Cordery, Dr

David Robinson, Dr Brian Jenkins, David Doran and Ian

Rowbottom. Secretarial staff involved were Mrs Joan

Kelly, Mrs Pattie McLaughlin and Mrs Julie O’Keeffe.

The final document was published in two

volumes. The first contained the design procedures

consisted of 14 chapters, authored by School staff

in 11 chapters and co-authored in a further two. The

second volume was composed mainly of maps of

design rainfall prepared by the Bureau of Meteorology

and some other design maps and charts. Both were

enduring classic texts. The document was re-published

in 1997 with only a few modifications but is currently

undergoing a further revision in the light of advances

in knowledge in an active field. Staff of the School are

involved in a supportive way. The Commonwealth

Government has provided $4 million for the first stage

of this revision.

professional officer david doran, professor david pilgrim and associate professor ian Cordery with a copy of australian rainfall and runoff. 1987CourteSy ian Cordery.

152 THE HISTORY OF THE UNSW SCHOOL OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING 1948 - 2010152 THE HISTORY OF THE UNSW SCHOOL OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING 1949-2010

• Al kabaila’s unique way to attract our attention ‘watch the birdie’

• Professor Woodhead – the CPM expert

• The expertise of V Rangan, Ian Gilbert, Al kabaila, R Jones

• Survey camp in the countryside

• Tharunka

• Industrial experience – great student experience of the real world and the eccentric people you need to get along with to be successful

• Staff were great characters and great lecturers (most)

• Ray Lawther driving up Civ Eng road in his MG

• CIVSOC Barbeques on the lawn near the village green

• The camaraderie, making new and lifelong friends

• The quality of the course – which we knew was world class, though tutoring support was lacking at times

• CIVSOC parties – the free beer

• Activists and bands on the Library lawn

• Neil Mickleborough (pictured) – awesome

• Sitting on the front lawn watching the Commerce girls come in and out of their School

• Failing structural analysis

• Construction camp at Darling Point – Bridge re-erection.

• Last two years had more interesting subjects

• The people I met

• The hardships of exams and ridiculous amount of subjects, but many happy memories of mateship.

• Alex Heaney & Theo ten Brummelaar - most engaging and encouraging

• Lunches at Science Café, Yellow submarine & Mech eng cafe

• Structures and hydraulics staff presented content in an interesting and challenging manner

• Max Irvine’s sharing of his US experience was ‘eye-opening’

• I most enjoyed the electives in languages, philosophy & communications

• Ray Lawther – excellent analysis teacher

• The construction camp elective; design and construction of roofs for water tanks at Fowlers Gap in 1982

• Every time I’m in a bank-up of Sydney traffic when there’s an obstruction in one lane, I remember Professor Black’s simple explanation in 4th year Traffic Engineering of queuing theory

• David Wilkinson’s elegantly simple physical demonstration model of saltwater purging from Sydney’s deepwater sewage outfalls

• The amount of work afforded little time for other interests or activities

• Ian Gilbert – technically excellent, Murti (pictured) – fabulous with numbers- formulae everywhere!

• Interesting, looking back, on the lack of environmental or heritage issues within the curriculum

• Drinking large quantities of alcohol

• The Blue Room

• The Union Bar

• Seeing Hoodoo Gurus at the Roundhouse

• Foundation day antics!

• Professor Manton ‘Slump test’ Hall

• Gorgeous George!

• General studies, I thought it a total waste at the time. I would enjoy them now, now that I’m more mature and ‘worldly’

• Great practical demonstrations by Alex Heaney

• Ian Lee – extremely approachable and helpful

• As a female engineer who started my degree in the late ‘80s, I wish I had done the degree now!! Being one of 10 girls at the time was also special

‘80S MOST MEMORABLE - ALUMNI RECALLre

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Student cartoon of lecturer ray lawther and his greatly admired Mg CiVil engineering yearbook 1983

THE HISTORY OF THE UNSW SCHOOL OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING 1948 - 2010 153THE HISTORY OF THE UNSW SCHOOL OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING 1949-2010 153

‘Many happy memories of mateship’

As noted, the ‘80s were a period of contraction, as the tertiary sector struggled with government parsimony, and School academic staff numbers plummeted. Numbers of higher degree research students also fell from 67 to 44. The MEngSc program remained robust however, averaging over 200 student enrolments each year. Graham Holt chose to do the MEngSc as a career move, from geologist to engineer - a change that he successfully accomplished. As a part-time mature student, campus life was ‘largely irrelevant’. At least there was parking on campus in the evening. His class mates, although similarly time-pressed, were friendly and collaborative, and he appreciated the variety of subjects available in the MEngSc which were ‘very practical – clearly well ahead of undergraduate coursework’.

The decade began with an avuncular Ron Woodhead providing students with a common room, Room 609, but ended with Max Irvine relocating them – to their declared disgust - to an eighth floor

space, as the computer labs began their inexorable march on School space. Despite the excitements – and increasing enrolments – of computer engineering, for civil engineering students, theirs was still a noble calling. John Colautti had ‘always wanted to be a civil engineer’, and for Andrew Sloan it was a School visit to a sewerage treatment plant, at the tender age of thirteen, which had set his star for him. Then and there, ‘I knew I wanted to become an engineer’. Andrew came to UNSW, like so many others, because it had ‘the reputation as the best engineering school in Australia’. The ‘good practical reputation’ persisted at home and abroad. Neil Brandom was attracted not just by the reputation but also by UNSW’s ‘proximity to the beach’. Others came because they were good at maths and science at school, and/or saw civil engineering as a positive professional career that would allow them to continue with these pleasures. Others ‘enjoyed construction and developing structures’; indeed, for Ian Sinclair ‘building structures excited me’.

Yet for all their own attraction to a dynamic, enjoyable and useful profession, civil students felt they struggled against an outside perception of civil engineers as ‘dull, dreary yobbos’.1 Issues of

THE STUDENT ExPERIENCESt

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status compared with other professions remained an important issue. Gennaro Riviezzi noted ‘Civil engineers should take a higher profile in Australia similar to doctors and lawyers – through better communication and self-promotion. Skills that need to be taught!’ – themes taken up by other alumni. Riviezzi was one of many ‘80s School alumni who went on to do further management degrees to open up their careers. Later generations of School students would receive more training on those essential communication skills.

Throughout the decade the valiant office bearers of CIVSOC worked hard to build and encourage School spirit. Student Yearbooks, dormant since the late ‘60s Faculty-wide publications, were revived within the School and were produced throughout the decade. In 1983, mindful of their large international student population (one in five) the students hosted their first Asian BBQ. To CIVSOC’s great satisfaction nearly half the School turned up.2 There were still cultural remnants of the ‘white Australia’ policy however. Abi Sofian Abdul Hamid, an international student from Malaysia, recalled ‘elements of discrimination in the class by a few students and lecturers’.

‘Apathy is our biggest problem,’ lamented the 1986 CIVSOC President, Peter Bailey, but he may have been too hard on himself. That year students had organised and attended several barbecues, enjoyed a harbour cruise, graduate dinner, a golf tournament, and a bush dance. The touch football Munro Cup had eight teams playing for it, and 130

CIVSOC T-shirts were screen printed and sold. The old rivalry from the establishment ‘up the hill’ was also still in force. Bailey notes the ‘crowning glory’ of the year was the winning of the ‘Civil Shield’ from Sydney Uni by ‘our mighty rugby team. Not only did we beat them in the rugby, but we got up in the boat race as well, thus carrying on the tradition that we know and love’.3

Nor was CIVSOC the only organising communal body – international students were active in their own associations, such as the Malaysian Students Association, Korean Students Association, Muslim Students Association, while the handful of women students organised their own informal support gatherings and connected with a women’s group from the Institution of Engineers.4 As well as the Munro Cup, and the annual golf tournament, alumni recalled playing softball, touch football, rowing, surfing. Those who lived in the on-campus colleges particularly recalled ‘extremely busy social and sporting existences’: soccer, volleyball, badminton, surfing, table tennis. Drinking and parties remained part of the general student experience. On campus, CIVSOC regularly provided free beer.

The student barbecues were initially held on the lawns near the Village Green on lower campus but by the end of the ‘80s they were regularly held on the lawn in front of the School building, which came to be seen by students – and staff – as part of their inalienable territory. The ‘civil engineering lawn’ with its growing grove of trees formed an important part of community building, socialising,

CiVil engineering bhp ingenuity gaMeS 1987 pic left: Spaghetti and bostik bridge pic right: trevor liu, year 4 Civil photoS keVin doig, uniken, CourteSy unSW arChiVeS.


and, yes, male ogling. One alumni recalled: ‘It was a great place to look out for the Commerce students which had more women’. Indeed, over the decade the Faculty of Commerce had moved from 26% female participation in undergraduate degrees in 1980 to 44% by 1989. The Faculty of Science also boasted nearly 50/50 by the end of the decade. But Engineering remained trapped in a gender twilight zone, creeping forward from 3% to 8% over the ten years. Helena Nolte who started her BE in 1988 recalls there were only ten women in her class of 140. In one way she wishes she had done the degree now, when women’s participation is so much greater, yet being one of so few at the time ‘was also special’.

As alumni of previous decades had recalled, there were two enduring constants of civil student life. The rewards and necessity of friendship, and the massive workload. Gennaro Riviezzi noted the amount of work afforded little time for other interests or activities. Completion rates were far from ideal, and there was still significant student attrition. Colin Sweet recalled, ‘In the beginning new friends seemed to disappear at an alarming rate’. CIVSOC conducted their own informal survey in 1982 and found that only 27% of School students actually finished the degree in the four years planned. They were somewhat reassured by a nationwide APEA survey which found only one-third of Australian engineering students managed to complete in the four years allocated.5

Informal CVSOC surveys in 1982 indicated up to a third of students aimed for a career in construction. Ron Woodhead’s engineering & construction management department provided popular, memorable and socially bonding construction camps. A student writer noted that on the trip to Fowlers Gap 100km north of Broken Hill, ‘Professor Woodhead made several attempts to get some serious discussion out of us on the trip, but few were sober enough to answer’.6

Students took the fifteen-hour train to Broken Hill, then the bus to Fowlers Gap, 100 km north. Some reported feeling ‘a bit overawed at what seemed the end of the world. No TV, no radio, no women and the nearest pub was miles away’.7 Fortunately both students and staff had brought their own supplies of beer. The construction of a spillway for a Freislich

Dam appears to have taken three years of student labour. It was BYO entertainment and a lot of hard physical work, yet students gave the ‘Concamp’ a five star rating. Concerts, meat feasts and tongue-in-cheek awards marked the end of the week.

In 1988 Vic Summersby, George Nawar and Don Fraser guided students to a new camp to Darlington Point in Southwest NSW, to reconstruct a historic 1905 bascule-type bridge, which had been dismantled in 1979 by the Department of Main Roads when a new bridge was built. Students reported with satisfaction that their work was ‘appreciated and supported by the local historical societies, engineering companies and various government Departments’.8

Alumni recalled many staff with affection and appreciation. They remembered ‘tough but fair academics’ and the ‘mutual respect between staff and students’. There were of course some less enjoyable encounters with teaching staff or course content but most alumni focused on the positive. One student recalled his last class of Soil Mechanics when the concerned lecturer ‘panicked because we were all going to fail. He said, “I can’t fail everyone, I have to pick a few bunnies”.’9

What did they most enjoy? Again that camaraderie. The CIVSOC barbeques and free beer are frequently mentioned and students had ‘many happy memories of mateship’. While the study itself was never easy, ‘a ridiculous amount of subjects’ – they enjoyed ‘making new things’, ‘the relaxed yet hard working atmosphere’, and ‘the world class quality of the course’. They enjoyed the diverse subjects covered, and the practical ‘hands on’ teaching and learning in the structures and water labs. They enjoyed student activities and listening to live bands on campus. They seemed to get off the civil lawn a bit more, many recalled gathering at the Science Cafe, the Yellow Submarine, and the Mechanical Engineering Cafe, in the Blue Room, on the Library Lawn and of course in the beloved Uni Bar.

In general, 80’s alumni felt their education had served them well, in careers that were challenging, satisfying and constantly changing. They remained ‘proud’ as Solern Liew noted, ‘to be part of UNSW’.


8610 MEngSc Master of Engineering Science - 36 creditsSpecialisations in: Construction and Management, Geotechnical Engineering, Public Health Engineering, Structural Engineering, Transport Engineering, Water Engineering.

8085 MEngSc in Waste Management - 36 creditsSubjects listed in 1989 & 1990 Annual Reports: 65 subjects - 3 Credits each except where otherwise stated

8.402G Transport, Environment, Community (6C)8.403G Theory of Land Use/Transport Interaction 8.405G Urban Transport Planning Practice8.407G Transport Systems Design (Non-Urban)8.408G Transport Systems Design (Urban)8.410G Highway Engineering Practice Part 18.414G Transport Systems Part I8.415G Transport Systems Part II8.416G Traffic Engineering (6C)8.701G Economic Decision Making in Civil Engineering8.702G Network Methods in Civil Engineering8.704G Stochastic Methods in Civil Engineering8.723G Construction Design8.724G Construction Technology8.725G Construction Accounting and Control8.731G Project Management8.732G Advanced Project Management Theory8.753G Soil Engineering8.777G Numerical Methods in Geomechanics8.781G Advanced Concrete Technology I8.783G Pavement Materials8.784G Pavement Design8.785G Pavement Evaluation and Maintenance8.788G Site Investigations8.790G Stability of Slopes8.791G Foundation Engineering I8.792G Foundation Engineering II8.793G Geomechanics8.802G Elastic Stability8.806G Prestressed Concrete I

8.807G Prestressed Concrete II8.809G Reinforced Concrete I8.810G Reinforced Concrete II8.812G Plastic Analysis and Design of Steel Structures I8.813G Plastic Analysis and Design of Steel Structures II8.818G Bridge Design I8.819G Bridge Design II8.820G Structural Analysis and Finite Elements I8.821G Structural Analysis and Finite Elements II8.831G Closed Conduit Flow8.833G Free Surface Flow8.835G Coastal Engineering I8.847G Water Resources Policy 8.849G Irrigation8.851G Unit Operations in Public Health Engineering8.852G Water Distribution and Sewage Collection8.855G Water and Wastewater Analysis and QualityRequirements8.856G Water Treatment8.857G Sewage Treatment and Disposal8.858G Water Quality/Management8.860G Investigation of Groundwater Resources 18.861G Investigation of Groundwater Resources 28.862G Fluvial Hydraulics8.863G Estuarine Hydraulics8.872G Solid Waste Management8.874G Waste Management Science8.875G Hydrological Processes8.876G Applied Hydrological Modelling8.877G Flood Design I8.878G Flood Design II8.880G Groundwater Modelling8.881G Industrial Waste Management8.901G Construction Risk Management8.909G Project (9C)8.918G Project Report (18C)25.715H Sources of Waste and Landfill Disposal

POSTGRADUATE COURSEWORk SUBJECTS OFFERED IN 1989

CIVSOC Presidents ‘80s

1981 Ian Paver

1982 Mick Rollo

1983 Greg Henderson

1984 Roy Todarello

1985 Neil Prosser

1986 Peter Bailey

1987 Michael Punch

1988 Martin Daly

1989 Brett Stephens

1980 Summers Paul Berwick BSc BE

1981 Cummings Peter David BE Civil

1986 Rallings Andrew James BE Civil

1987 Baker Mark Francis BE Civil

1989 Cernanec Peter Vojtech BE Civil

UNIVERSITY MEDALISTS


1989 CIVIL ENGINEERING (BACHELOR OF ENGINEERING BE 3620) FULL-TIME COURSE

Years 1 - 4: Day course 28 weeks

Year 1 | Semester 1 (S1) & Semester 2 (S2)

Code Course S1 S2

1.981 Physics 4 3

2.991 Chemistry 1CE 0 6

8.110 Computing and Graphics 3 3

8.120 Engineering Mechanics 1 4 4

8.130 Civil Engineering Practice 3 2

10.001 Mathematics 6 6

25.5112 Geology for Civil Engineers 3 0

Total Hours per week 23 24


Code Course S1 S2

8.2110 Systems Engineering 1 2 0

8.2120 Systems Engineering 2 0 2

8.2210 Engineering Construction 2 2 0


8.2310 Materials Technology 0 4

8.2320 Concrete Technology 1 4 0

8.2410 Mechanics of Solids 1 3 0

8.2420 Mechanics of Solids 2 0 3

8.2430 Structural Design 1 0 4

8.2610 Hydraulics 1 2 0

10.022 Engineering Mathematics 2 4 4

10.381 Statistics SC 2 0

29.441 Surveying for Engineers 0 6

29.491 Survey Camp 1 wk 0 3

One General Education elective 4 4



Code Course S1 S2

8.3110 Engineering Computations 3 0

8.3210 Engineering Management 1 2 0



8.3310 Soil Mechanics 3 0

8.3320 Geotechnical Engineering 0 3

8.3330 Concrete Technology 2 0 2

8.3410 Structural Analysis 1 3 0




8.3510 Traffic Flow Theory 3 0



8.3630 Water Supply and Wastewater Disposal 3 0

8.3640 Engineering Hydrology 0 3

One half General Education Elective 0 2


Must complete 60 working days of industrial training before Year 4 commences. Year 4 | Semester 1 (S1) & Semester 2 (S2)

Code Course S1 S2

8.4110 Industrial Training 0 0


8.4320 Metals Engineering 2 0

8.4330 Pavement Engineering 2 0



8.4440 Timber Engineering 2 0

8.4520 Transport System Analysis 3 0

8.4620 Water Resources Engineering 3 0

And two of the following:

8.4210 Construction Major 0 11

8.4310 Geotechnical Major 0 11

8.4410 Structures Major 0 11

8.4510 Transport Major 0 11

8.4610 Water Major 0 11

One and one half General Education electives

6 0


botany bay breakWater Wrl research testing for banksmeadow reventment, 1980s CourteSy nSW arChiVeS


Construction camp – reconstruction of the historic bridges at Darlington Point and Cowra

Like the survey camps before them in the ‘50s and ‘60s, the engineering

construction and management camps of the ‘80s and early ‘90s were highly popular

with students. Budding civil engineers always appreciated the opportunity for

practical hands-on work and the week-long ‘concamps’ for fourth year construction

majors – usually held at the University’s research properties at Fowlers Gap or

Wellington - built both material and spiritual community.

Over the years the construction camps involved many School staff including

Graham Easton, Don Fraser, Peter Kneen, George Nawar, Jonathan O’Brien, Vic

Summersby, and Ron Woodhead, with help from other UNSW colleagues such as

John Brain, Professor Terry Dawson, Professor John Kennedy and the staff of the

UNSW research stations.1 Vic Summersby who led many camps was always impressed

by the ability of many students to innovate, ‘particularly when they discovered that

they had forgotten a vital component of the project they were trying to build.’ 2

His colleague Don Fraser, from the structural engineering department, was

particularly interested in civil engineering history, especially the history of bridges.

He felt that ‘the contribution of engineers and their works, both past and present,

tends to be taken for granted, and is often forgotten.’ The preservation of historic

engineering structures can build public awareness and appreciation of the role that

engineering works perform in the development and prosperity of communities.

In 1985 Don Fraser had been awarded a Monash Medal by the Institution

of Engineers for his papers on bridge history in NSW.3 It was his passion for the

conservation of engineering heritage which led Don to initiate an innovative School

construction camp in 1987 for Darlington Point Bridge, where School fourth year

students reassembled a steel tower from the replaced 1905 bascule bridge over the

Murrumbidgee River. Successive student teams planned and executed the project

over a period of three years, and this time it wasn’t just their own community they

were strengthening. They received free technical assistance from many sources

together with enthusiastic and voluntary local support. Their success was endorsed

by IE Aust which awarded the project an Historic Engineering Marker noting the

input of the students.

It was during this period that Don learnt of another historic bridge in need

of reconstruction. The Cowra Bridge, spanning flood plains of the Lachlan River,

had been in service since 1893 and was a composite timber and steel bridge with

bowstring trusses of 49m spans with shorter approach timber trusses and timber

beam spans. It had been an excellent, innovative, structurally efficient and cost –

effective bridge for its time, but ninety years later there were doubts over the abilities

of the main truss timbers to carry ever increasing vehicle loads, and demolition was

scheduled for December 1988.


Don was alarmed to learn that within a few months, ‘there would be NOTHING

on site to show that a historically and technically significant bridge had ever been

there.’4 It was a job for a super hero, the School of Civil Engineering. After discussions

with the Department of Main Roads (DMR), the demolition contractor, and the

town of Cowra, he put forward a counter proposal to the Cowra Shire council, to

save one of the three truss spans, as a joint Council-student project over two years,

and to relocate the truss span in the nearby park. Council agreed, and the School

proceeded.

Over the next two years School students planned, designed and carried out

the restoration and relocation of the truss. In the first year they cleaned and painted

as much steelwork as was possible, braced the truss across the roadway, set out the

pier holes for the Council excavator, and trialed lifting and moving the truss. Cowra

floods in the intervening periods endangered the underside of the elevated truss,

and scoured all four piers but local commitment to the project had increased, and

Council and RTA efforts saved the project from potential disaster. The second group

of students assembled at the site continued painting the steelwork and applied

preserving oil to the timbers, using scaffolding and a boom unit.

Students received much help in their labours from many local organisations

and individuals who ‘contributed in a variety of ways; food, accommodation,

equipment, materials and cash.’ Don also recalled the support of Heads of School

Max Irvine and Robin Fell, and engineering construction and management

colleagues George Nawar, Jonathan O’Brien, Vic Summersby and Ron Wakefield.

With the work completed in time, and in budget, there was a celebratory opening

ceremony on 28 Sept 1990 ‘near the resplendent truss’ and afternoon tea was shared

by students, locals and representatives from the Shire Council. Don noted that ‘on

the open market the project was estimated to cost in excess of $100,000 but with

so many donations of all kinds, the real cash expenditure was kept to $20,000. It

clearly demonstrated what a well organised co-operative effort could achieve.’5

Unfortunately the truss was demolished in 1999 for safety reasons. However, there

remains an interpretive sign at the site.

In 2008 Associate Professor Don Fraser received an Engineers Australia Award

Of Merit for Engineering Heritage.6

top image: Cowra construction camp 1989 SChool hiStory arChiVeS.

Student site managers, Cowra 1990darlington point bridge steel tower before reconstruction 1986School staff george nawar and associate professor don fraser at re-erected darlington point bridge tower 1989.photoS CourteSy don fraSer.

1980s - unsw faculty of engineering · 136 the history of the unsw school of civil and...

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