Academia. The School of Civil and Structural Engineering, University of Plymouth

Earth has been used for several thousand years as a material in the construction of embankments, dams, walls and occasionally domed roofs. Examples of earth buildings include the Great Wall of China, which is faced only with stone, houses and granaries in many Third World countries, and some of the older dwellings in many other places. It is estimated that about a third of the world’s population live in earth dwellings. R.H. Saxton

The results of recent studies on the masonry structure forming the western nave of Exeter Cathedral are presented. These have been generally derived from the point of view of a limit analysis based on the lower-bound theorem of plasticity. A numerical procedure is proposed which aims to generate feasible thrustlines from a sequence of conventional linear elastic finite element analyses which account for cracking. E.W.A. Maunder

The Port of Wadebridge lies at the head of the River Camel Estuary on the north Cornish Coast. The 7 mile estuary theoretically provides navigation for coastal vessels to the Port; however, the last regular use was for road stone, imported from the Irish Republic in the 1980s. At the end of 1991, after the completion of the Statutory Procedures, the Secretary of State awarded a contract to bypass the town of Wadebridge to the north with a single-carriageway road. E. Hollingshurst