Carterton forestry company, Farman Turkington Forestry, won both the Harcourts Hamill Realty Innovation Award and the Trust House Supreme Award late last year for their ground-breaking approaches to environmental standards and land stewardship. 

This success at the Spark Business Hub Wairarapa Awards, hosted by Business Wairarapa, follows their Micro Innovation forestry competition win against 18 other nominees for their ‘Blaze it Bridge’ design.

The Harvesting Micro Innovation Challenge focused on proposing ideas to help harvesting and logging operations.

The innovative portable bridge design providing safe passage for fish was developed in response to the fact that during fish spawning season, from about May through September, logging vehicles were not permitted to cross some water courses. This created a problem for those in harvesting operations with forests on the other side.

The employee the bridge was named after, Josh Blazek, had a goal to give forestry companies access to blocks so they could harvest trees during fish spawning time.

He first created a hardwood design prototype that was laid into the watercourse, and the fish were able to pass without sediment discharge or any disturbance to the stream bed.

However, Farman Turkington Forestry owner, Guy Farman, says the concept was parked when it couldn’t withstand a 40-tonne truck running over it.

After damaging a cattle stop on a forestry block, which ended up back at the forestry company's yard, Mr Farman says he had a lightbulb moment and decided to use a cattle stop rather than wood.

The concept was re-imagined as a steel bridge made from recycled steel and railway irons.

After finding success in its trial run, it was given minor improvements, and from start to finish, it took about six years to create.

“Now rivers like this can be crossed by logging trucks at any time,” he says.

“They’re about 600mm in height, so the river can be quite high and still be safely crossed by vehicles.”

The money will be used to build more bridges - an investment for the company, he says.

The bridge, which required enormous amounts of time to engineer and weld, can be bought and leased

It was designed using dimensions that fit in the back of a Hiab truck, meaning pilot vehicles are not needed.