Structural & Bridge Engineer
Registered Professional Engineer, Pr Eng Gauteng, South Africa
Pren is a bridge and structural engineer, and a certified bridge and culvert inspector. He vlogs on his YouTube channel and posts technical commentary on LinkedIn. A techie at heart, who loves to vibe code.
Almost fifteen years in structures, bridges and infrastructure delivery.
Pren is a Registered Professional Engineer with experience spanning structural and bridge engineering, infrastructure planning, project delivery and technical leadership.
He currently leads a structural engineering division, carrying responsibility for the delivery of major public and private infrastructure projects, covering technical governance, quality management and engineering risk across the portfolio.
Beyond technical leadership, he holds practical corporate governance experience as a company director and former shareholder of a consulting engineering practice, and he actively mentors graduate and candidate engineers.
Selected projects
Six that show the range: a cable-stayed crossing, a fully integral deck, a bridge built sixteen times over, a pump station anchored against flood buoyancy, and a live highway deck lifted off its bearings.
A series of sixteen 20 m span composite bridges engineered for repeatability. One detailed design, built over and over. Managed quality control and fabrication inspection through to client submission.
A 30 m cable-stayed entrance bridge on a 15 m central pylon, resolved against hydraulic, ecological and geotechnical constraints on a tight site. Whole structure modelled in SoFiSTiK FEM.
Multidisciplinary coordination on a R2 billion water pipeline. Designed the low-lift pump station with rock-anchored stress bars to resist flood-induced buoyancy, and led structural design of the abstraction works, including canal walls, filtration structures and ecological fish ladders.
A 39 m fully integral reinforced concrete bridge. No bearings, no deck joints, with the deck and substructure acting as one frame. His scope ran from preliminary design through to detailed design.
Temporary works design to lift a live highway deck and replace its bearings. The halving joints made the lift sequence the whole problem. The answer was a tailored structural steel jacking system worked around them.
Temporary works only. Pren's scope was the launch nose used to erect the deck, together with its connection detailing and bracing systems, measuring 10 m long by 5.5 m wide by 3.4 m high. The bridge itself was not his design.
Project index
A fuller record of bridges designed, structures assessed and temporary works engineered between 2013 and 2025.
Inspections, preliminary bridge and culvert design and technical reporting across four new bridges, one rehabilitation and three culverts.
Preliminary and detailed design for two new bridges, one widening, one rehabilitation and a culvert, with full bridge reports.
Inspection and preliminary design of four bridges and eight major culverts, with technical documentation and recommendations.
Review and approval of proprietary bridge joint systems for introduction to the South African market: structural analysis and performance validation.
Launch nose design for an incrementally launched pipe bridge, sized to the moment and shear demands set by the lead engineer.
A 30 m structural steel pedestrian bridge linking maternity and antenatal wards, plus a 120-ton reservoir support retrofitted into a tight footprint.
Inspection of approximately 60 structures; ITIS documentation and sign-off to COTO standards.
Condition assessment and modelling of a 110 m suspension bridge, with a recommendation to the client on whether construction should continue.
Inspection and structural evaluation for a proposed road bridge, producing as-built records, structural models and client recommendations.
COTO-compliant inspection of 15 structures with full inventory and condition assessment.
Inspection and reporting across various bridge and culvert structures; project management and tender evaluation for sub-consultants.
Full inventory and condition ratings on three bridges to COTO and TMH19 methodology.
Structural integrity inspection of the crusher structure: safety margin assessment, defect mapping and recommendations on D.E.R. methodology.
Identified and recorded 73 structures, classified to TMH19 and rated to SANRAL D.E.R. standards.
Temporary works design and structural steel configuration for deck lifting and bearing replacement.
Temporary works following an electrical fault; chemically anchored bracket systems developed in Hilti Profis for both railway and road access conditions.
Jacking design across a skewed deck geometry, using universal structural steel jacking frames for piers and abutments, with prestressed anchorage and Prokon analysis.
Deck jacking and bearing replacement using chemically anchored systems.
An unorthodox incremental roof launch: connection design, tension-rod suspended floors and retrofitted supports, supervised through night demolitions.
As-built records generated by inspection, then design of a composite oven floor and structural steel frame for air cooling systems.
Structural steel buildings designed to a crack width limit of 0.1 mm for hazardous containment; Prokon and SoFiSTiK for concrete and steel detailing.
Structural steel roof design with the emphasis on insulation and thermal loading.
Aluminium framing system for a new glass façade, fast-tracked with proprietary screw systems and designed for thermal loading.
Reinforced concrete switchgear buildings, transformer bays and site supervision.
A 6 Mℓ square reservoir and valve chambers on steep terrain, resolved with retaining walls and C3-stabilised fill; FEM and hand-calculation validation.
A 60 m-long jointless building housing sensitive switchgear: suspended floors, crane beams and blast structures under strict shrinkage criteria.
Site supervision and quality assurance on coal stock yard structures, including RC plinths, slabs and elements for the coal conveyor system.
Career, 2013 to present
From contractor's site engineer through to divisional leadership and directorship.
Leads the Structural Engineering Division: technical governance, quality management, client relationships and engineering risk management across major public and private infrastructure projects.
Corporate governance and niche structural engineering through his own consulting practice.
Progressed from Structural Engineer to Senior Structural Engineer to Associate, and served as a shareholder participating in strategic business oversight. Bridge Design Specialist on SANRAL projects; bridge engineering, structural engineering, project management and business development.
As the contractor's engineer on site, managed day-to-day construction execution: setting out the works, supervising subcontractors and site staff, and running quality assurance and testing to ensure construction matched engineering drawings, specifications and the project programme.
Awards & contributions
Industry awards, judging panels and invited technical contributions.
Registration & membership
Engineering Council of South Africa, 2019
University of the Witwatersrand, 2012
South African Institution of Civil Engineering
Committee of Transport Officials, 2019
Contact