Beith Street

Careys were awarded the enabling works, drainage, substructure, superstructure and hard landscaping packages on the project. The key challenges for this project were based on the need to complete works to a tight schedule and within a live city centre environment and were mitigated through a combination of careful pre-construction planning and our use of innovative construction techniques.

The enabling works package entails site clearance, site earthworks (contaminated land), installing a site access road and installing a piling mat ahead of the augured piling. The drainage package entailed installation of a foul connection into the main sewer on Beith Street, by using directional drilling from within the site and boring into an existing manhole on the live sewer. The site drainage consisted of both foul and storm drainage. The storm drainage incorporates an outfall to the river Kelvin, with attenuation and a hydrobreak controlling the flow. The substructure involved the installation of pilecaps and ground beams on 900 diameter concrete piles. The ground floor had an insulated vented gas membrane installed underneath.

The two main buildings are two reinforced concrete frames standing at ten-storeys high and include a basement level. Block A comprised four six-cell concrete cores and Block B consisted of two five-cell cores. Our team constructed these using a slipform methodology, subsequent works included 20000m2 of concrete slabs and precast stairs. We installed two tower cranes to facilitate the superstructure package. The external hard landscaping works comprised kerbing, resin bound paving, granite paving and external services trenches.

Fundamental to this project was completing works within a very tight time frame in central Glasgow. We finished ahead of schedule thanks to careful pre-construction planning and sequencing. Furthermore, we used an innovative TOPMAX formwork system for the superstructure and ultimately this resulted in key time savings (and therefore cost savings) for the client. Throughout the works we took precautions to limit noise and dust so as to avoid impacting on local stakeholders.