Different kinds of reinforcing materials have been tested in order to find out the possible increase in the bearing capacity and ductility of an ice-cover. A number of fifty ice-beams have been tested both in the field and in the laboratory. It has been shown that by rather simple means, for instance by wooden reinforcement, it is possible to increase the bearing capacity about three times and the ductility up to twenty times. The ice-cover can be supplied with reinforcement both in the upper surface and in the lower surface. It has moreover been shown that rather high tensile stresses in the reinforcement can be utilized when the ice-cover is loaded above the cracking stage. At ultimate load, tensile stresses in steel-reinforcement are found to be in the vicinity of 400 MPa. Shear or heavy bond slip can be the cause of failure when too large amount of reinforcement is used. In order to get more accurate design recommendations, a number of ice-beams have been studied in the laboratory. The stress-distribution in the compressive zone and its change with the loading time have been studied in some creep-tests. A bending theory that includes the effect of creep in the compression zone has been derived. The agreement between theory and experiment is sufficiently good