Architect(s) : RMJM
Address : Lime Rd, FALKIRK-SCOTLAND, United Kingdom
Latitude/Longitude : 56.000365,-3.841570
Client : Wheel – British Waterways, Visitor Centre – Morrison Construction Ltd
Contract Value : Wheel – £14 million, Visitor Centre – £2 million
Text description provided by the architects. The Falkirk Wheel is the world’s first rotating boat lift designed to connect the Union Canal with the Forth and Clyde Canal 25 metres below and forms part of the Millennium Link Project – a £74 million investment to link the west and east coasts of Scotland with an inland waterway.
Completed ahead of schedule in April 2002 and opened in May 2002 by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, the Falkirk Wheel honours the bold vision and imagination behind the Millennium Link itself. It is a functional sculpture which both symbolises and celebrates the renaissance of the two canals – and what yet may follow.
RMJM was also responsible for the design of the innovative visitor centre. Provision is made within for display areas, cafe and office spaces, all gathered together under a timber clad building form allowing uninterrupted views of the Wheel through a 45 degree glass wall.
Contributed by RMJM
