Barry McAuley, PhD Post-Doctoral Researcher 086 014 4853 bmcauley@cita.ie www.bicp.ie
BICP Case Study 1 – New National Children’s Hospital Background The new National Children’s Hospital (NCH) is the largest, most complex and significant investment project ever undertaken in healthcare in Ireland. The NCH site is centrally located within Dublin City at the St James’s Campus. NCH will bring together into one entity three existing hospitals; Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital Crumlin, Temple Street Children’s University Hospital, and the National Hospital in Tallaght. The ultimate aim is to share the presence of this new hospital facility with St. James’s Adult Hospital and, in time, also the Coombe women’s and infants' university hospital by integrating them into a single health campus. These hospitals will merge to form the Children’s Hospital Group before transition to the new facilities. The children’s hospital will provide in-patient care and all surgery (including day surgery), while the satellite centers at Tallaght Hospital and Connolly Hospital will provide urgent care and outpatient care. The proposed Children’s Research and Innovation Centre, which is an integral part of the new children’s hospital, will be co-located with the existing academic facilities on the campus at St James’s Hospital
Project Description
the same parapet height as the southern side. Located about midway along the northern side is a public entrance with two further entrances into the hospital on the eastern side, for self-presenting patients and ambulances accessing the Emergency Department. The building will provide a number of landscaped and recreational areas including courtyard gardens at ground level and a significant garden covering most of the building footprint at Level 04 which will have the benefit of fresh air and distant views to the city. The new hospital will accommodate 380 children as in- patients, each in their own individual room with en-suite bathroom and facilities for a parent to comfortably stay with their child. In addition, there will be 87 day care beds. The design also encompasses a 52 bed family accommodation building adjacent to the new children’s hospital. A helipad and a two-level underground car park are also to be constructed. The initial cost estimate for the hospital was in the region of €650 million euro, excluding fit out costs. The finished complex is expected to be completed by 2019, and to become fully operational by 2020. Ground works began on the first phase in July 2016.
Barriers The building will be three storeys above street level along the South Circular Road and four storeys along its southern elevation. The building will be four storeys along its northern and eastern elevations with
There was a requirement to have all stakeholders involved within the design which normally would result in difficulties for the design team with regards
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to the presentation of technical information to nonspecialists. All hospital projects present a complex array of issues but pediatric facilities pose a number of unique challenges because of the age-range of the children and young people and the close participation of their extended families. The inclusion of multiple stakeholders, including the staff of the existing hospitals, clinical leads and local residents, had the potential of the design team relying on non-design specialists to provide them with an understanding of the required functionality of the space. The National Pediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB) is responsible for overseeing the building of the hospital. The board’s members have combined experience and expertise in architecture, planning, engineering and procurement to bring this very large and complex project to completion.
Solution BIM was requested to a Level 2 standard due to the complex nature of the building and the congested nature of the proposed site which was situated within an extremely busy area. A BIM model offered the opportunity to visualise space easily, therefore improving an awareness of underutilised spaces, as well as being used by the whole team to further collaboration techniques, as it offered an easier way of interpreting the project requirements. Collaboration was key in the NCH design process and BIM was an essential tool that helped non-specialised end-users to contribute more effectively during the construction process. The early application of BIM was crucial in demonstrating the visual impact on the surrounding area. BIM was implemented from early
project conception and was used as a key tool in obtaining planning permission. With the imposition for a Level 2 standard it offered the opportunity for the design team to generate room data from the model, apply complex algorithms in generating roof panels, advancing augmented reality practices and applying innovative methods of analysis. To ensure the client's needs were adequately addressed, an Employer Information Requirements (EIR) document was created which detailed the requirements and expectations of the client with regard to BIM on the project. The EIR enabled the design team to understand the needs of the client from an early stage. The EIR details roles and responsibilities, technical issues, submittals and the management of models. This process has led to the design of a world-class building which will enable staff to deliver the best possible clinical care for children and young people, while also seeking to provide a pleasant environment for staff and families. The key design members are detailed in the table below.
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Role Client Architects
M&E Engineering Cost Consultant Consultant Engineers
Organisation The National Pediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB) Designers Building Design Partnership (BDP and O Connell Mahon ARUP
Linesight O Connor Sutton Cronin
BIM in Action BDP used their BIM knowledge from the very beginning to offer a qualitative advantage to the project development process, maximising collaboration between design team members, identifying conflicts in design drawings and maximising accuracy in the scheduling and measuring of building elements. Initially, Murphy Surveys conducted a series of laser scans of surrounding buildings, streetscape, site features, topography, visible and underground services, etc. BDP requested 2D CAD files of the elevations and 3D DWG files of all the levels, which they then imported into Revit to create an overall topography in BIM. In order for BIM to work a BIM protocol (a supplementary legal agreement that is incorporated into professional service appointments and construction contracts by means of a simple amendment) and a BIM Executive Plan (BEP), were introduced as an additional legal documents. As the project progressed virtual illustrations and videos were used to demonstrate the visual impact of the hospital on the surround areas. An example of this is the Luas which is a tram/light rail system which serves the Dublin area and stops outside the hospital. A number of 3D images and videos were used to demonstrate how these works will be undertaken. Videos can be viewed at the NCH website (www.newchildrenshospital.ie/designvision/video/).
enabled an understanding of design proposals and further permitted them to engage with the design. The figure below provides a view of what the Client would see if wearing the Google Cardboard glasses.
With 6,500 rooms, the NCH facility maintenance database requires about half a million Furniture Fixtures and Equipment (FFE) objects that need to be embedded with information that must be coded, coordinated and specified. Codebook, which is a software designed to produce room data sheets as an output of the BIM process, was used to input or export information on the room properties and FEE within the Revit models. The codebook database was hosted on Codebook’s servers where one can manage the servers, provide backup and restore support. This ensured all data was accessible to the client and several consultants. The picture below shows an illustration of data extracted from Codebook.
BDP, through integrating their modelling workflows with cloud rendering services, now use Google Cardboard as a primary visualizing tool for presentations. By adopting this immersive technology, staff members of the NCH were placed inside a virtual representation of their building, which 3|Page
Dynamo software was applied within the design to analyse the roof panels based on their slope angle. Dynamo extends BIM with the data and logic environment of a graphical algorithm editor. Within Dynamo all curtain panels were selected by family type. The panel area was then computed and through Dynamo the now remapped result range was mapped to a colour range which enabled automatic overriding of panel colors within the view. Some of the advantages of using Dynamo included reducing the requirement for manual and tedious tasks.
for the structural analysis of structural steel and reinforced concrete construction.
Conclusion Overall the NCH has provided a significant stepping stone for Ireland on their BIM journey. Though still in the early design stage, there have been significant benefits through the more intelligent management of information. The application of innovative technologies has enabled an eclectic range of clients to become closer to the project conception, than what would have been conceivable if a traditional approach had been adopted. This has enabled potentially a world-class hospital to be built which will derive benefits across the complete lifecycle. Case Study to be accredited to Dr. Barry McAuley (CitA/DIT), Dr. Alan Hore (CitA/DIT) and Prof Roger West (TCD).
Navisworks Manage was the primary tool used at an early stage for clash detection. Clash resolution meetings were held, where appropriate, for each workstage and included clash detection reports within monthly design team reports. Linesight worked closely with BDP and O Connell Mahon to ensure the models were formatted and information was embedded in the form of coding for each element in the model. This enabled the models to be analyzed more effectively in CostX and approximate quantity take-offs to be calculated. This process allowed for greater cost certainty as the design developed.
Acknowledgements Sean O’ Dwyer (BDP), Dominic Hook (BDP) and Zucchi Benedict (BDP). Published: October 2016
Structural frame and finite element analysis and design for the New Children’s Hospital was primarily carried out using two structural programmes, Tekla Structural Designer 2015 and SCIA Engineer 16. Both programmes can import 3-D Revit frame models and following some manipulation can be used
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