Even the most cynical of visitors to last month’s IUT 2002 show at Sargans in Switzerland would be hard pressed to leave unimpressed by the scale of the exhibition and uniqueness of the underground setting. Vying for attention amongst the 4.5km network of tunnels that make up the Hagerbach Test Galleries, were well in excess of 100 stands ranging in size from one man and his laptop to a couple of hundred square meters crammed with a massive range of equipment.
Top marks go to Herrenknecht, Bernold-Ceresola, Sika Tunneling and Mining, MBT and Mapei, to name but a few, for really impressive displays. Obviously these players have the finances to attend shows in such exuberant style, but by and large the standard of all was exceptional, from the large to the small. This, coupled with an optimistic atmosphere for the future health of the European sector, made for an enjoyable and educational couple of days.
But the question has to be asked, are the number of industry events becoming too many? The T&TI Dates & Events page gets fuller every month. It is simply becoming too expensive to attend all of these events, especially for smaller companies, and even harder to know which ones will be of most benefit. Between September and December this year you could attend 19 events in 14 countries. The upshot is many smaller companies are choosing to invest less time and money internationally, instead choosing only to attend parochial events. This could have a strong negative effect on the global growth of the industry, after all, international conferences and exhibitions are designed to be a forum for discussion and exchange of ideas.
Exhibitions seem over-run with manufacturers, with only a few interested clients and contractors; whilst international conferences are brimming with clients, consultants and contractors, but supported by only a few major manufacturers and a handful of local manufacturers. The solution obviously lies in loyalty to definitive tunnelling events, such as the ITA World Congress and the Rapid Excavation and Tunneling Conference in the US. Basically, more of us need to make the effort to get together, less often.
