Construction & Civil Engineering Issue 165 July 2019

www.ccemagazine.com ISSUE 165 JULY

Making connections When it comes to utilities networks, PN Daly Ltd is an expert supplier of utility design, engineering, construction, installation and technical services See page 20

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contents Chairman Andrew Schofield Editor Libbie Hammond

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web@schofieldpublishing.co.uk Exclusive Features Darren Jolliffe

FEATURES 2 Infrastructure As vast sums are poured into infrastructure, it’s critical that it is planned and implemented in the most cost efficient way

6 foundations

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With the UK amidst a high-rise revolution, now more than ever before structural engineers are having to adopt new ways of working

8 Health and safety The business benefits of a positive health and safety culture include efficiency improvement, new business and increased profits

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11 / 18 News Updates and information from the construction and civil engineering market

12 Hospital construction Construction companies can play a vital role in supporting the transition of today’s healthcare system into a more modern approach

16 Human resources John M Staves takes a look at the role of the structural engineer – a position that deserves more prominent recognition

Independent Sales Dave King

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company profiles

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Infrastructure

Informed

decisions Jim Hall discusses how advanced computing is making it possible to collate infrastructure data from multiple sources, map and model it, and use advanced visualisations to demonstrate and explore scenarios

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athering data on national infrastructure systems, analysis and scenario planning has historically been cumbersome and required intensive manpower, time and computing systems beyond those held in even research institutions. This meant that planning infrastructure projects in a joined-up way was not possible due to the size of the datasets

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Jim Hall

and number of data providers involved.

The UK Infrastructure Transitions Research Consortium (ITRC) was set up to address that problem. Now in its second phase, ITRC-MISTRAL (MultiScale Infrastructure Systems Analytics) is a consortium of seven leading UK universities, led

by University of Oxford. It focuses on investigating ways to improve the performance of infrastructure systems in the UK and around the

world to help reduce the risk of infrastructure failure and ensure investments are better targeted.

Funded by bodies including the Engineering and Physical Science Research Council, it aims to provide data and modelling to help governments, policymakers and other stakeholders in infrastructure make more sustainable and resilient infrastructure decisions.

With vast sums being poured into infrastructure, it’s critical that

it is planned and implemented in the most cost efficient way, is future-proofed, and meets the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

Substantial investment goes into infrastructure: the UK’s National Infrastructure Plan has set aside over £460 billion for the next decade. This year’s budget1 includes £28.8 billion pledged to a strategic roads investment package, £770m to improve transport infrastructure in cities,

and new funding for fibre and 5G investment. Billions more could be spent if disaster struck major infrastructure nodes.

The first National Infrastructure Assessment, published in 2018, which ITRC provided input into, was a great achievement in evidence gathering and analysis.

We would like to see the next assessment continue to look towards infrastructure systems that promote and enable a society that is modern, clean,

efficient and inclusive. We’d like to see sewerage and waste water treatment being included in the next phase so that it covers all of the economic infrastructure sectors in one analysis, and which pays attention to crucial interdependencies (e.g. between energy and transport). The replacement value of sewers in England and Wales alone is about £180bn.

These dependencies are an area that ITRC provides particular

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Infrastructure

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expertise in – what we call a ‘system of systems’ approach to modelling. The processes of digitisation and electrification are leading to increased interdependence between infrastructure networks, whilst resource scarcity in areas such as water and energy are also intensifying interdependencies.

We also need the ability to scenario plan which is flexible enough to take into account new data on growth in population, climate change, or technology developments. For example, future planning could focus more systematically on the benefits of catchment-based approaches to delivering green infrastructure services which will impact on water quality as much as water quantity.

area, for example planning a new housing development should involve a holistic look at education and health policies as well as around complementary infrastructure needs such as transport, workplaces, digital communications, water, electricity and sewerage.

ITRC has developed a unique and powerful set of computer tools, NISMOD (National Infrastructure Systems MODel), to bring infrastructure planning and modelling into new realms. An additional ITRC work programme focuses on Multi-Scale Infrastructure Systems Analytics (MISTRAL), working to develop an integrated analytics capability to inform infrastructure decisionmaking from local to global scale.

Planning around infrastructure should not be made in isolation but by taking into account other infrastructure in the surrounding

Projects and collaborators ITRC is already working with UK government, private sector, and overseas governments on projects

including providing the analytical framework for the assessments carried out by the UK’s National Infrastructure Commission for the UK’s National Grid, HS2, Department for Transport, Defra, JBA on the risk of bridge scouring and floods, Caribbean Islands’ infrastructure needs with the UN, and Tanzania’s transport links with the World Bank.

ITRC works closely with DAFNI, the Data & Analytics Facility for National Infrastructure to advance UK infrastructure research.

DAFNI is funded by an £8 million investment from the UK Collaboratorium for Research on Infrastructure and Cities (UKCRIC), based Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in Harwell, Oxfordshire and managed by the Scientific Computing Department (SCD) of the UK’s Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC).

Currently DAFNI provides a managed service for the UK

research community to help them develop models to run on its secure computational resources and to work with DAFNI’s world-leading infrastructure data science. Longer term it will be available to academics and industry to use directly, transforming processes which might currently take two days of dedicated computer- and manpower into a fraction of day using DAFNI’s processing power and modelling.

Together with the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), ITRC recently launched a new tool, SustainABLE, providing development practitioners with an online tool resulting in practical actions to ensure that their infrastructure project supports achievement of the different targets of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, adopted in 2015 and agreed by 193 countries. https://sustainable.unops.org/ is available for use now and the first module walks users through mapping the gender-related SDG targets of women’s empowerment and infrastructure against areas

including energy, transport, water, solid waste, ICT, health, education, government and housing. Specific subsectors can also be targeted such as air transport, surface water management, or emergency response.

This system-of-systems approach which runs through ITRC’s research allows it to explore a multitude of visualisation methods and technologies across sectors rather than being restricted to single sectors.

Six different sector models are already in the database: transport, energy demand, energy supply, water supply, waste water, and solid waste.

These developments will allow planners to gain views into scenarios and to fully test changes at modelling stage, rather than implement projects and then have to make costly retrospective changes. It will also allow policymakers to create macroeconomic cases for infrastructure, which we have not previously had the data or computing power to generate.

By 2020, the ITRC national infrastructure portal will be open

to academia and industry as well as policymakers, providing access to infrastructure datasets, simulation and modelling results.

1 https://www.gov.uk/government/ publications/budget-2018-documents

Jim Hall is Director of the UK Infrastructure Transitions Research Consortium (ITRC) and Professor of Climate and Environmental Risks at the University of Oxford. The UK ITRC is a consortium of seven leading UK universities. It investigates ways to improve the performance of infrastructure systems in the UK and around the world to help reduce the risk of infrastructure failure and ensure investments are better targeted.

For more information, please see:

www.itrc.org.uk The Data & Analytics Facility for National Infrastructure (DAFNI) is a state-of-the-art capability to provide the UK’s next generation platform to support the development of essential infrastructure services, revolutionising the UK’s ability to adapt to a changing climate and technological landscape.

For more information, please see:

www.dafni.ac.uk

5

Foundations

A tall order M Laying a firm foundation for high-rise buildings. By Barry Mellor

ore high-rise buildings are now being constructed than at any other time in Britain’s history. There are currently more than 270 existing tall buildings and structures in the UK, 70 per cent of which are in London1.

Despite only 17 of this number being over 150m (492ft) in height and just one building – The Shard in London – over 300m, this overall number is likely to sky-rocket in the coming years as around 500 tall buildings are in the pipeline2. Of these projects, more than 85 per cent are planned in London, while the rest are clustered in key cities such as Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Salford3.

As such, this high-rise boom is presenting new challenges for engineers, particularly in relation to the structural design of below ground foundations. Tasked with bringing ever-daring architectural feats to life that often tower

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Barry Mellor

above a bustling metropolis, many structural engineers are finding that traditional design methods are frequently difficult to apply with any confidence when limited by time, space and budget constraints.

The result is a clear imperative is to utilise more innovative and sophisticated methods, where to taking a more ‘ground up’ approach during the design and planning stages is key. More and more, this starts with making the most of innovative construction materials where pioneering solutions are not only helping to strengthen and minimise the need for piling in foundations but can also meet the complex structural requirements of making a modern skyscraper a reality.

Structural considerations When constructing a tall building, there are a number of characteristics that can have a significant influence on foundation design, including the building

weight and the corresponding vertical load to be supported by the foundation, which can be substantial.

For many skyscrapers, the building weight increases nonlinearly with height, so both ultimate bearing capacity and settlement need to be considered carefully. What’s more, high-rise buildings are often surrounded by low-rise podium structures which are subjected to much smaller loadings – meaning differential settlements between the highand low-rise portions need to be controlled.

This is certainly the case for high-rise construction in London where the presence of dense suburban structures below ground such as the London Underground’s network of train tunnels can make piling very difficult.

To overcome this challenge, more and more structural engineers are finding that the answer lies with changing

their approach to concrete specification. One such way is the use of concrete made from secondary aggregate - materials which would otherwise become landfill - instead of conventional concrete solutions.

For instance, when Lytag, a lightweight aggregate made from fly ash generated by coal fired power stations, is used in the concrete mix for laying foundations, it has been proven to reduce incidence of piling for foundations by up to 25-30 per cent.

Consequently, the smaller foundations needed make it much easier to construct tall buildings in and around densely populated city centres such as London, with the added benefits of smaller and cheaper piling rigs and savings in vibration, shuttering, blinding, placing and hook time.

Lightening the load Due to its unique composition, Lytag also affords contractors and structural engineers a raft of other invaluable benefits, such as reducing the number and size of columns, in order to create bigger structures with greater spans, whilst at the same time being able to reduce the total load of their builds - which essentially works hand in hand with the

smaller foundations the secondary aggregate can help to create.

Crucially, it’s important to note that although lightweight material can effectively reduce the composite deck concrete slab load by approximately 25 per cent over normal weight control, it offers the same high level of structural performance as standard weight concrete.

Overall, replacing natural aggregate with secondary aggregates for the composition of lightweight concrete mixes significantly reduces the total volumes of concrete and reinforcement steel needed in the construction of tall buildings.

account for the parameters of using lightweight concrete, which includes adjustments needed to meet current design codes.

In some instances, concrete mixes using secondary aggregates, although lighter, maybe weaker due to host of other factors that need to be accounted for.

It’s also worth remembering that in replacing the need for quarried natural aggregate, this approach reduces CO2 emissions in buildings by up to ten per cent This is because by being up to 50 per cent lighter than natural aggregate, it means fewer truck journeys are needed to transport construction materials – making it the ideal ‘green’ solution for builds looking to achieve a high BREAM status.

A lighter solution With the UK amidst a high-rise revolution, now more than ever before structural engineers are having to adopt new ways of working that push the boundaries of architectural design. For many, taking a ‘ground up’ approach is key, where making the most of innovative construction materials such as Lytag can not only help to strengthen and minimise a building’s foundations but can, ultimately, ensure the long-term success of modern skyscrapers.

Design framework

1, 2, 3: AMA Research, Construction in

For structural engineers looking to utilise lightweight concrete solutions and achieve the associated benefits for both foundations and the structure overall, the need to plan early cannot be overstated.

This begins from the early stages of design and modelling of a high-rise building on prominent design software suites such as SCIA, where the drop-down option for lightweight concrete must be activated to formulate the correct calculations. In addition, all modelling must also

the High-Rise Buildings Market Report UK 2018-2025

Barry Mellor is Lytag’s commercial manager.

Lytag is an Aggregate Industries business and benefits from the resources and capabilities of a highly skilled research and development team, as well as the financial and global business strength of its holding company Holcim.

For more information, please see

www.lytag.com www.aggregate.com www.lafargeholcim.com

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Health and safety

Safety first David Towlson looks at the business benefits of a positive health and safety culture, its impact on the bottom line and why people are starting to look at an organisation’s moral compass before working with, or buying from it

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istorically, health and safety has frequently been seen as something that gets in the way of efficiency in business. However, in reality, consistent research across all types of industry reveals that when impact on lost time is examined, it is often the safest companies in the world that are also the most efficient, wellmanaged and most profitable.

Health and safety training in particular, at all levels, doesn’t simply develop understanding

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of risk analysis, but can also promote the idea of balancing health and safety risks against operational cost.

Costs associated with injury and ill-health are widespread and can include process downtime, lost production, worker absence, loss of reputation and management time and resources for investigation. Compliance, in effect, becomes the starting point for managing these costs.

Legal compliance Nasir Aryani holds both the

NEBOSH International Diploma in Occupational Health and Safety and the NEBOSH Environmental Diploma and is Project HSE Manager on one of Saudi Arabia’s biggest current infrastructure programmes - the development of a 176km metro system which will service the country’s capital of Riyadh. Around 75,000 employees are working on the project, with Nasir taking on health, safety and environmental management responsibility for the construction of four new underground stations.

Saudi Arabia has recently strengthened its legislation around safety and environmental issues and compliance is important, as well as ensuring work is not interrupted through any serious incidents. Nasir commented: “Legal compliance is necessary to avoid business disruption. The consequences of a failure could be a significant fine, civil action or even being barred from operations, depending on the severity. Following serious incidents, projects have been brought to a halt by the investigating local authority and the company has had to pay compensation affected personnel.”

Nasir also talks about the positive business benefits of improving health and safety: “In a safe environment employees perform their roles without any hesitation, increasing selfconfidence and ultimately leading to better productivity. With fewer incidents the organisation gains more productive working hours, which of course leads to healthier profit. In the longer term, an organisation can build a good reputation with clients, winning more projects in the future and retaining its more skilled and experienced employees.”

Strong evidence In the UK, strong evidence has emerged to support the kind of messages that Nasir delivers.

The Tideway infrastructure project is upgrading London’s sewerage system to cope with the modern-day demands of the city. It is constructing a new 25km interception, storage and transfer tunnel running up to 65 metres below the river Thames.

Steve Hails, Director of Health, Safety and Well-being at Tideway explained the thinking behind an innovative induction programme designed to embed a positive safety culture across the entire operation: “We wanted to be

transformational in our health and safety approach, so we developed a fully-immersive and inclusive induction,” he said. “There is an acted-out scenario that escalates into a very serious incident, which everyone on the induction witnesses. It’s very cinematic and impactful. Participants engage with the characters on a personal level and we usually see a strong emotional response at this stage because of the way we approach it - for almost everyone who attends the scenario becomes very real.”

The result is an induction process that not only grabs the attention of everyone involved in the Tideway project, but that genuinely leads to a strong desire among the workforce to keep themselves and their colleagues safe from harm. Steve added: “Through a range of KPIs and some historical analysis we have been able to benchmark ourselves against previous major infrastructure projects and we’ve found our performance, on Lost Time Injuries for example, has been significantly better, which of course has a positive impact on the bottom line.”

Triple bottom line Of course, there is more to the bottom line than purely financial outcomes. The emergence of what is known as the triple bottom line, an accounting framework which commits organisations to focus as much on ‘people’ and ‘planet’ as they do on ‘profits’ sits well with health and safety.

It implies that organisations should reset their moral compass, so profits are not put before people for example. It is an approach that Paul Hendry, Vice President of Health, Safety and Environment at Jacobs is a strong advocate of. Jacobs is a global organisation providing scientific, technical, professional and construction services, as well as programme-management for

the commercial, government and infrastructure sectors.

Paul has a passion for tackling mental health issues at work. In 2018, Jacobs received a Gold Award in the Mind Workplace Wellbeing Index, recognising its efforts in embedding mental health into policies and practices and demonstrating long-term commitment to the mental wellness of employees.

Tackling mental health is part of the strategic plan at Jacobs, a significant aspect of which is to measure the level of health and safety activity in the organisation, from the 1300 positive mental health champions there are to the number of NEBOSH qualified personnel employed and everything in between. “We believe if you measure those good behaviours and encourage an increase in those good behaviours then naturally you will drive down your incident rate. As a forwardthinking organisation, that, more than anything, is where our focus needs to be.”

There is growing recognition that positive health and safety culture leads to efficiency improvements, wins business, grows profit and retains talent, while at the same time achieving what is was designed to do in the first place - save lives and protect people from harm.

David Towlson is Head of Qualifications and Assessment for NEBOSH, a leading global provider of health, safety and environmental qualifications. Its internationally recognised qualifications help to raise the competence of safety and environmental professionals as well as individuals at all levels in the workplace.

Since its inception in 1979 more than half a million people from around the world have studied for a NEBOSH qualification. Tens of thousands join this number every year studying with its network of 600 course providers in over 132 countries.

For more information, please see

www.nebosh.org.uk/qualifications

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news

New arrival to UK Congrid, the Finnish construction quality and safety software company, is expanding into the UK and has appointed Daniel Hunt as UK territory manager.

Daniel will be responsible for spearheading customer acquisition and hiring further staff in 2019. Already established in Finland and Sweden, the UK is the first country Congrid has moved into outside of the Nordic region.

Already the market leader in Finland, Congrid’s cloud-based app is aimed at project managers and quality managers at construction companies involved in various projects, including housing, offices, hospitals and schools. It introduces new levels of transparency and communication for safety and quality on construction projects and helps

deliver zero-defect buildings to clients.

“We aim to bring our expertise and knowledge to the UK market and introduce new, smarter ways of working relating to safety and quality in construction.

Our approach offers the UK construction industry a better understanding of what has been built and how,” explained Timo Makkonen, CEO of Congrid. “The

entire industry needs to change its mindset towards quality – quality is everyone’s business. Our software enables all stakeholders involved to participate and take responsibility for quality and safety. What we’ve experienced is that quality has become far more of a priority and users are looking for peace of mind, to better manage how a building is built and have a record to demonstrate this.”

Landmark London development Queensgate Investments and Rockwell now have the green light for their proposed redevelopment of the Kensington Forum. Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, resolved to grant planning permission for the landmark new hotel, serviced apartment and conference scheme on Cromwell Road, to create a

Home from home The timber frame at Nottingham’s newest student accommodation, The Nest, is now taking shape onsite, with the view to create 57 new flats by the end of the year. The £5 million scheme, located at Derby Road, will feature 57 luxury, purpose-built student studios and a ground floor commercial space.

Wayne Oakes, director at Dice – the multi-disciplinary engineering consultancy, which has been working on the project since its inception last year and delivered civil and structural design services - said: “The Nest is a bespoke, student accommodation which has been designed with international students in mind – incorporating the latest in studio design, great communal facilities and all in an amazing location, close to the city centre.”

As Wayne noted, several local teams from Nottingham have been involved in this project: “From us on the engineering side and BEC on the mechanical and electrical engineering side, to the contractors, J A Ball, delivering the work itself – which is, of course, fantastic for the local economy and the city’s construction industry.”

truly remarkable, world-class visitor destination.

Designed by leading architects SimpsonHaugh, the proposals will replace the existing 906 room hotel, recognised as a local eyesore, with an exceptionally high-quality development providing outstanding facilities including restaurants, bars, health spa and conference facilities.

Kensington Forum will also create more than 800 employment opportunities and support these with £1.4 million of training initiatives. It will also accommodate 62 genuinely affordable Social Rented homes, worth £90 million (the first private development in London to deliver a 100 per cent genuinely affordable homes).

Alongside the hotel will be a new, publicly accessible and sensitively designed 2700sqm garden square, which will be the only publicly accessible green space within one km of the site. A further £2.8 million will be put towards public realm improvements to the area around Gloucester Road station.

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Hospital construction

A healthy approach A positive prognosis for construction and modern healthcare. By Chris MacLeod

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onstruction has an important role to play in shaping

the future of the healthcare sector.

As an industry, we must continue to innovate and work smarter to help meet

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Chris MacLeod

the challenges of an underpressure healthcare system being bombarded by multiple pressures.

An uncertain political landscape, the lasting legacy of austerity and a decline in capital investment in the NHS continue to pose tough questions about the future

availability of funding and staff.

Improvements in medical care, lifestyle and diet also mean that we’re living longer. As a population, we’re collectively getting older, a fact borne out within Office for National Statistics research. Eighteen per

cent of us are now aged 65 and over while 2.4 per cent are aged 85 and over. Indeed, the ageing population is having a direct impact on the healthcare sector, placing a significant strain on already under resourced services.

Of course, construction

doesn’t have all of the answers to resolve these complex, societal issues. However, as an industry, we possess the expertise to collaboratively implement solutions that can ease the burden and make a meaningful contribution.

Progress At GRAHAM, we continue to construct new, large-scale hospital buildings. Schemes such as the Baird and Anchor projects for NHS Grampian within its Foresterhill Health Campus in Aberdeen (ÂŁ134m), the Ulster

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Hospital construction

Hospital Acute Services Block (£95m) and the Replacement Acute Mental Health Inpatient Facility at Belfast City Hospital (£33m) can all help address the pressures faced by the NHS. However, a trend is developing whereby a much greater proportion of clients are now focusing on lower cost refurbishment and expansion projects, particularly improvement

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works centred on strengthening sustainability and carbon reduction.

As an example, in collaboration with the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust, we are upgrading its New Cross Hospital (Wolverhampton), Cannock Chase Hospital (Staffordshire) and wider estate to the value of £20m.

Looking forward, a higher volume of key construction opportunities will emanate from

the primary care sector, with the shift towards integrated primary care hubs continuing at pace.

The integrated model reflects the flow of investment away from secondary care and hospital infrastructure, to the creation of primary and community care facilities that accelerate the delivery of services outside of the acute hospital system.

Research has indicated that hubs reduce admissions into A&E through earlier intervention and the provision of integrated services closer to home.

Furthermore, we’ve seen the positive impact that innovation in design can have in significantly enhancing the delivery of social care – and how the effective utilisation of space, where GP practices, pharmacies and step-down inpatient beds are all situated in one development, greatly assists the reduction of ‘bed blocking’ in hospitals.

At this juncture, it’s worth noting that the combined market value for the care of the elderly is estimated to be worth over £22bn for both residential care and nonresidential care. This represents a huge sum of money.

Clearly there are opportunities to add value in this sphere and positively influence the future direction of new build, capital programmes that promote patient-centred, dignified care.

Defined goals The Government is also working closely with the industry to achieve defined goals. Within its ‘Construction 2025’ strategy paper it has set out an ambitious vision for the next six years.

Among its ‘clear and defined’ aspirations are the lowering of construction costs by 33 per cent and the delivery of projects 50 per cent faster from ‘inception to completion, for newbuild and refurbished assets’.

Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) present an

obvious route to achieve these targets, and the wide-scale adoption of off-site modular solutions can have an enormous impact on healthcare, namely by delivering increased capacity – faster.

The mass production capabilities associated with MMC can still be combined with a bespoke approach, so that buildings have the flexibility to meet the changing needs of healthcare professionals and patients. In turn, standardised design, the development of standard components, and repeatable room designs can play an influential role in streamlining processes and reducing costs.

In fact, our Healthcare Framework team recently standardised a number of principal components across three key projects, resulting in approximately ten per cent savings in supply chain costs, capital costs and on-going maintenance for the NHS.

future requirements of clinicians and surgeons.

By embracing change, harnessing technology and realising the potential of MMC, those of us within construction can play a vital role in supporting the healthcare system’s modern transition.

As demand for first-class healthcare services rises, at GRAHAM we’re confident that our industry is ready for the challenge.

Digital technology Complementing MMC, digital technology delivers multiple benefits, including the production of a built environment that is not just more economical to build, but more economical to run and operate long-term.

The use of Building Information Modelling (BIM) provides a data rich representation of the healthcare estate, and forms the basis of an effective facilities management system that can be used to make informed decisions on refurbishment and renovation beyond the initial construction phase.

Equally, the speed of technological advance, such as robotics, artificial intelligence and automation, also means that buildings designed with anything up to a 60-year lifespan must be future-proofed, flexible and easily adapted to accommodate the

Chris MacLeod is GRAHAM Framework Director. GRAHAM is a privately-owned company that specialises in the delivery of award-winning building, civil engineering, interior fit-out and facilities management. A truly national business, with an annual turnover of £767.6m (2018), it operates from 23 regional offices throughout the UK and Ireland and employs over 2200 colleagues.

Proudly ‘delivering lasting impact’ since 1798, it is currently completing over 100 live projects across a range of key sectors including education, healthcare, commercial, retail, highways and rail.

For more information, please see

www.graham.co.uk

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Human resources

Time for recognition John M Staves asks: What is a structural engineer, why is the profession undervalued, why is it important and why the role is not clear?

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irst and foremost, structural engineers provide an essential service to the

construction industry, helping to create record-breaking structures, beautiful structures, useful structures and sometimes just cool structures. This can

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John M Staves

be anything from bridges, rollercoasters and skyscrapers to hospitals, schools, homes and public artworks.

Fundamentally a structural engineer’s role can be defined as designing buildings, bridges and other types of structure to resist the forces applied to them. These

forces range from gravity, or the weight of people and equipment within a building to the dynamic effects of people using a building or impact from natural events such as earthquakes.

We make sure the building or the structure works well in practice, depending on what it

is used for. For example, a dance floor shouldn’t vibrate too much when people jump up and down on it.

As a profession of problem solvers, structural engineers use a myriad of methods and skills to develop solutions. Every structure is different, so we have to be creative to overcome the unique challenges presented by each project. Balanced with a degree of practicality, we don’t just think about the final permanent structure, importantly we also think about ‘how’ it will be built.

Safety is a central part of our approach, and we are the experts, understanding the critical importance of managing the risk to society through the lifecycle of a structure. From design and construction, through to operation and demolition, we take account for the whole structure’s lifespan, in accordance with local legislation and best practice. As the guardians of public safety, we are key to ensuring the built environment is robust and that lessons are learned, and implemented when things go wrong.

Working sustainably is another foremost concern as we look to minimise the amount of materials used in the construction process, innovating approaches to make use of different, more environmentally-friendly materials.

This has the benefit of reducing demands on natural resources and recycling where possible.

For all our skills, we don’t work alone but as part of a team alongside architects, builders and other engineers. Construction is a collaborative game. Sometimes the structural engineer will lead the team, which calls for both project management and general management skills.

I am proud to be a Chartered structural engineer and of the contribution I make to the construction industry, and more generally to society. However, I

sometimes get frustrated with the general misconception about what I do, the service I offer, and the benefit I deliver. This applies across the public as a whole, within the political classes and, even worse, in other allied professions!

Let’s get it straight; I do more than design beams! As outlined above, my skill set is broad, and my contribution to projects is undoubtedly more impactful than just safely transmitting vertical loads to the ground.

As a Chartered structural engineer, my education and training took longer than a medical doctor (GP) takes to qualify. Like a doctor, I have had to gain substantial experience and submit to both a gruelling examination and peer review to prove my competence. Just like a Doctor, I also have a professional obligation to keep up-to-date and improve my ability with Continuing Professional Development (ongoing training).

To put it into perspective, many lives depend on a single decision I make as a structural engineer, if an occupied building collapses because of an error I make, many could be injured. A doctor deals with decisions that typically affect one person at a time.

The value a doctor adds is clear, and he is rightly recognised for that. This is because most people have had some form of interaction with a doctor, either directly or via a close relative.

The value we add is subtler.

You are likely sat in a building, reading this. A structural engineer has probably made sure that the building is safe and resists the forces applied to it. The structural engineer provides robust and durable shelters that people need to protect them from their environment. Did you cross a bridge on your journey to work or home? A structural engineer was undoubtedly involved in its design and currently helps with

its maintenance, making sure you arrive safely. You may not have engaged the structural engineer directly in either case, but you benefit from his work.

It is not a common trait of a structural engineer to shout about what he achieves and what value he adds, but it can be considerable. A little extra investment on the structural design of a building (spend on structural design is an investment because it will save absolute project cost) can pay back multiple times over during construction. Works can be kept simple and efficient, by an early input from the structural engineer.

If investing £1k on engineering fees could save £2k of build costs, how often would you want to invest £1k? With the extra time that buys to refine and improve the design, and impact the buildability, this is easily possible and doubles your money!

And finally, the next time you visit your doctor, just think, the surgery or hospital wouldn’t be there without the work of a competent structural engineer.

John M Staves CEng FIStructE is Fellow and Vice President of the Institution of Structural Engineers and Managing Director of Michael Aubrey Partnership. The Institution of Structural Engineers is the world’s largest membership organisation dedicated to structural engineering. It upholds standards, share knowledge, promote structural engineering and provide a voice for the profession and has 28,000 members operating in 105 countries.

For more information, please see

www.istructe.org Michael Aubrey Partnership is dedicated to a single purpose: ‘excellent design’. Because structural engineering lies at the heart of the business, you can feel confident that your design is structurally sound and ‘buildable’.

For more information, please see

www.mapl.co.uk

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news

Smart solution

Making an IMPACT An AHR-designed advanced engineering research facility for Swansea University has reached completion. The Institute for Innovative Materials, Processing and Numerical Technologies (IMPACT) is part of the University’s strategic expansion of the College of Engineering and, as a Centre of Excellence, will provide a unique colocation facility for academia-industry partnerships in ambitious research and development.

Gary Overton, director at architecture and building consultancy practice, AHR, commented on the project: “As a powerful, collaborative environment, we approached the design for IMPACT in a way that prioritised a multidisciplinary way of working throughout. The environment stimulates ingenuity by working with the people inside, embedding connectivity between core research areas so that the industry and academia feel like the spaces are encouraging them to work together as one.”

As research flourishes within, a living wall made up of 5500 plants on the building’s exterior reflects the growth of knowledge through rich biodiversity for onlookers to enjoy, as well as wildlife, with nest boxes for swifts, sparrows and bats. The design has utilised renewable energy technologies wherever possible, with features including the integration of solar thermal collector technology into the façade in a way that has not been implemented before.

Rubber roads Tarmac is the first in the UK to develop a new asphalt technology capable of recycling end-of-life tyres (ELTs) into roads. With 40 million waste tyres produced every year in the UK, the company has created an innovative asphalt mix using granulated rubber.

Tarmac estimates that it will be possible to recycle and reuse up to 750 waste tyres for every kilometre of highway surfaced with the new material, depending on the thickness of the road, which would help to reduce the 120,000 tonnes of rubber waste exported from the UK annually.

As part of recent trials of the new material, Tarmac supplied asphalt with rubber in Coventry. Rob Little, senior engineer, Highways Technical, Coventry City Council, added: “Coventry City Council is delighted with the rubberised asphalt trial; we hope we can use more of the product across the city in the future to help divert waste tyres from landfill and incineration to reduce the carbon footprint for road construction projects in Coventry.”

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Portuguese sustainable dynamic structures and furniture start-up Corkbrick Europe has completed its latest investment round by raising €271,394 on leading investment platform Seedrs, attracting 252 investors taking its total number of Seedrs investors to 500. The funds raised will go towards increasing production ten times to 4000 pieces a day.

Inspired by Lego and Nature, Corkbrick can be used to build interior and exterior structures in general and furniture in particular.

With Corkbrick the user can assemble and disassemble everything in minutes, giving a new use to the same ‘brocks’ depending on its configuration (seven different ‘brocks’ are available).

It’s a unique, natural, flexible, simple, easy, durable, resistant, renewable, sustainable, light, sound and thermal-insulation solution to build most of pieces of furniture, walls and structures with no tools, screws or glue.

Commenting on the investment, Founder and CEO Miguel Reynolds Brandão said: “We are delighted yet again by the support and interest we’ve experienced throughout both of our investment rounds, and believe it demonstrates the clear demand for a sustainable product that can bring smart solutions for smart living. We look forward to welcoming both new and old investors on our journey into our next exciting phase of growth.”

The company also recently announced that despite ongoing Brexit uncertainty it will open up a UK branch in 2020.

Painting platforms tested Mabey Hire has played a significant role in supporting Forth Crossing Bridge Constructors (FCBC) and Galliford Try in facilitating the testing of four platforms, which will be used to paint the 1.7-mile-long Queensferry Bridge connecting Edinburgh and Fife.

A series of towers, assembled using Mabey Hire’s Mass-25 modular propping systems, were used to support 12-metre spanning beams, mimicking the girders of the bridge. The platforms were then hung from these beams whilst load tests were carried out to confirm the safe working load (SWL) of the platforms.

Mabey Hire’s team of engineering experts headed to the Forth Ports Marine Yard testing site in early April to pre-assemble 12 of the shoring systems or ‘towers’, and

to help FCBC understand how the structures worked. Each painting platform was supported by eight Mass-25 towers at any one time, with the towers moved by FCBC as the testing of the platforms progressed.

Mabey Hire also provided a jacking system, which was initially used to lift the platforms off the ground and up onto the spanning

beams supported on the Mass25 temporary support towers.

The jacking equipment was operated by FCBC’s onsite jacking specialists.

Now the platforms have been successfully tested, they will connect to the underside of the Queensferry Bridge to facilitate the painting of the structure, which is due to take place later in 2019.

3D bathroom Researchers from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) have developed the capability to 3D print an unfurnished bathroom in less than a day. After printing, the bathroom is furnished with toilet fittings to become a pre-fabricated unit, ready for

Revitalised project unveiled In June 2019, the iconic Winerack on Ipswich’s historic waterfront - a £30 million residential and commercial development - reached a milestone by completing the first collection of apartments (3rd Quarter) revealing its finished red brick and steel façade for the first time.

The landmark development is the result of collaborative working between Homes England, New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership and Ipswich Wharf Developments, and will deliver 150 residential homes, over 5000 square feet of commercial space and a high-tech car stacker parking system improving the local area.

Ipswich Wharf Developments Ltd kick started the Winerack development again investing £10 million after it was left in a semiconstructed condition since the financial crash of 2008. Together with £15 million from Homes England’s Home Building Fund and a £5 million loan from New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership’s Growing Places Fund a unique financial set up between public and private investors was created ensuring that the project was revitalised.

use in construction projects. Its interior includes a sink, mirror, shower, toilet bowl, ceramic tiled walls and flooring, complete with concealed drains and piping. This could potentially help firms build prefabricated bathroom units (PBU) about 30 per cent more quickly and 30 per cent lighter than current PBUs. This innovation was developed by a joint research team led by Assoc Prof Tan Ming Jen from NTU’s Singapore Centre for 3D Printing, in partnership with Sembcorp Design and Construction, and Sembcorp Architects & Engineers. ©NTU Singapore

(from right) NTU Assoc Prof Wong, Assoc Prof Tan and Er Lie from Sembcorp

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profile: PN Daly

All about connectivity

PN Daly’s strong relationship management has helped the company maintain constructive partnerships with the UK’s leading utility companies and developers for over five decades

T

he privatisation of Britain’s utility companies and the opening up

of a contestable connections market in 1990 considerably extended the playing field for PN Daly. Having started as a term contractor for statutory

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undertakers (first gas, and then water, and electrical undertakers), the Milnrow-based company, which has now been around for 53 years, has over time expanded the volume and the scope of its work.

This has become so, thanks to the organisation delivering a number of high-quality projects that built

its reputation as a trusted provider of a broad range of services.

Today, PN Daly specialises in supplying design, construction, connection, repair, maintenance, and support services to gas, water, electricity, and telecommunication networks, mainly in the aforementioned statutory undertakers sector and

that appeals to customers and keeps them coming back over and over again. “Not necessarily all news that we give our clients, is good. Nevertheless, we do not spare them the bad news or the possibility of something going wrong,” he insists.

“Inevitably, there are people who do not want to hear the whole truth and instead choose to go to providers who only tell them good news, even if this might as well be fake news. When clients deal with us, they know that we will be completely transparent with them and they understand that this is what will work best for both parties in the long-term.”

Family values

the construction industry. The company is now in a position to better serve the requirements of its customers, and it places strong emphasis on maintaining close working relationships with those utility companies it has been working with since its inception in 1966.

If the success of a business is to be measured in the repeat orders it achieves, then PN Daly can certainly be examined as a reference point in this regard.

According to the company’s Commercial Director, Patrick J Daly, honesty is the trait exhibited by the organisation

Employing this culture of openness and honesty has allowed PN Daly to work on multiple prestigious contracts over the years. One project the company is particularly proud of is the work it did for Bericote at Florida Farm in Haydock. There, PN Daly upgraded 4.2 kilometres of off-site infrastructure and delivered services to two mediumpressure gas units. Upon the completion of the scheme, the company was lauded for its proactivity and efficiency

by Bericote, with the latter expressing its strong desire to collaborate with PN Daly again in the near future.

The flatness of PN Daly’s hierarchy is one of the prerequisites for the efficient internal communication that

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profile: PN Daly

takes place within the business and, more importantly, the trust employees have in the company and the career growth opportunities it presents. Notably, the family-owned organisation takes pride in its exceptionally high staff retention rate.

“People want to work in an environment where the company cares about its customers, products, reputation, and, of course, the staff it employs.

We have an in-house training team dedicated to keeping our people upskilled and to adhering to the latest health and safety regulations,” Patrick maintains.

“We also hold on to family values in the way we run the business and make sure that our senior managers are as approachable as possible. As a result, communication with them is often

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direct when required.”

Commercial Manager, Danny Scholes, echoes this sentiment: “I have been here for over 15 years now and no two days are ever the same. I have established a strong relationship with our senior management team, which has contributed immensely to my successful development at the company.”

Healthy competition Maintaining this level of support to its employees will be key for PN Daly as the business takes on the task of revitalising its workforce within the next five years. “We are aiming to bring a lot of young people into the company, who are keen to learn and pursue a career in the utilities sector. Our role is to foster their development and offer them all they need to grow their

capabilities, which, eventually, will result in the deepening of PN Daly’s expertise, as a whole. This has been our philosophy all along – to increase individual skill for the benefit both of the worker and the company itself,” Patrick discusses.

He adds an important clarification: “We are interested in attracting talented people to the industry regardless of their background and education. We are open to anyone who is ready to commit themselves and we firmly believe that no one should discount working in the utilities sector. If you are talented and willing to grow, it will surely make use of your skills and time.”

At the end of our conversation, Patrick takes the time to share his views on prevailing market conditions and the challenges and opportunities they generate

for PN Daly. “We are currently engaging a lot with the authorities ensuring healthy competition in connections, as we are concerned that the regulatory regime has not supported competition in recent years to the same degree as in the time before the Brexit vote. Therefore, we now find ourselves having to motivate statutory undertakers to fulfil their obligations under the regulations.

This is becoming an increasingly important function of our business, which serves to benefit not just us, but also the wider market,” he concludes.

PN Daly www.pndaly.co.uk Services: Utility design, engineering, construction, installation and technical services

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profile: HTC Wolffkran

Towering above the competition The sight of red Wolff tower cranes is a familiar one across London’s skyline, and is a constant reminder of the successful partnership that culminated in the formation of HTC Wolffkran back in 2015

I

t was in May 2015 that German premium tower crane manufacturer Wolffkran announced its acquisition of the UK tower crane rental

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company HTC Plant Ltd (HTC).

The truth is, however, that HTC had been synonymous with the Wolffkran tower crane for more than 40 years prior. In fact, at

the time of the acquisition, HTC possessed a fleet of over 200 of these cranes, as well as a staff of 370 crane experts and more than 50 years of industry experience.

These qualities meant that HTC would perfectly complement the global growth of Wolffkran, and thus HTC Wolffkran was formed.

“The Wolffkran range of tower

cranes is seen as one of the very best and strongest in the world, and having this product behind us is a massive selling point for our business,” begins HTC

Wolffkran’s Managing Director, Richard Coughtrey. “Today, we enjoy direct access to new equipment, world class service support and over 100 years’

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profile: HTC Wolffkran

worth of experience with the product, enabling us to offer a unique reliability guarantee to our customers.

“We employ some of the finest people within our industry – including tower crane operators, supervisors, appointed persons, erectors, service technicians, engineers and back office staff – who have been with the business for many years and have a special degree of expertise when it comes to complex projects.

Our teams allow us to provide our customers with a complete lifting package, as well as innovative engineering solutions that are tailored to specific requirements.”

Since Wolffkran purchased the business back in 2015, it has gone from strength to strength.

Our strategy going forward revolves around continuous improvement in all aspects of the business.

Our customers and their requirements are continually evolving and we must evolve with them The company’s core customer base comprises of leading, blue chip construction companies in the UK, and includes the likes of Mace, The Kier Group, Multiplex Construction, Bam Construction

and Skanska, to name a few.

These companies actively seek the type of work that fits with HTC Wolffkran’s strengths, namely complex, high rise structures, requiring substantial engineering solutions. They are also companies that share the same values, particularly in terms of health and safety, which HTC Wolffkran considers to be its number one priority each and every day as it strives to lead and shape this topic within the tower crane industry.

Newer, efficient models “We find that we have to continually be innovative with our engineering solutions when

SMIE At SMIE, we provide our customers with a high level of quality and service across their tower crane fleet. Our highly skilled engineers are available to install new systems, service existing systems, and provide expert guidance on your anti-collision and crane safety needs. SMIE UK are proud to work with Wolffkran.

SMIE systems utilise WiFi, allowing for rapid site configuration with no down time of the jobsite. With newly released features such as remote 3G/4G, ProSITE can now provide remote data collection and viewing services.

At SMIE, we remain committed to industry innovation and solving the daily challenges of our customers safely and efficiently. We are proud to be the choice for crane operators around the world who benefit from our anti-collision cameras and peripheral systems, such as beacons and anemometers.

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profile: HTC Wolffkran

it comes to the aforementioned complex projects in order to deliver on our customers’

requirements for time, cost and lifting capacities,” Richard explains. “Space is often at a

premium, particularly in city centre locations and we have to ensure that the tower crane solution is not too invasive on the project. The superior freestanding height of our project enables our customers to build structures without the intrusive ties, enabling the building to be waterproofed much quicker. For our part, we have to be nimble, and demonstrate flexibility and innovation in our approach, and we see this as one of our key strengths!”

The Wolffkran range of hydraulic luffing tower cranes is particularly sought after and recognised as being the best in the business, offering excellent lifting capabilities, high function speeds and delivering classleading reliability when compared to competing models. “The 166B and 355B models are running at high utilisation rates at present, and the new generation of CLEAR tower cranes – particularly the new Wolff 6020 – are also proving to be very popular in the UK,” Richard details. “The business is continually investing in its tower crane fleet in order to deliver newer, more efficient models that better suit the needs of our customers.

London success “In recent times, for example, we have invested heavily in tower sections to ensure availability not only of the crane top, but to also guarantee that we can meet the customer’s requirements on tower height and configuration.

Additionally, we own two Grove mobile cranes, which we renew on a three-year cycle, which enables greater flexibility in our crane installation and dismantling operation. We are also planning to make a significant investment in our yard and facilities in the coming years in order to provide a world-class base for our operations.”

Today, a high proportion –

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approximately 70 per cent to be exact – of the work undertaken

by HTC Wolffkran remains located within the greater London area.

Here, the company has become well versed in handling the various challenges posed by working in and around the capital, from the various TFL rules and regulations it must abide by to the issue of limited space to operate within.

As a result, it boasts a significant presence within the city where it has successfully delivered iconic buildings, landmarks and stadiums of the highest calibre.

New regions The remaining 30 per cent of the company’s activities are spread across the rest of the UK, where, over the last few months, it has seen a number of regions, such as Leeds,

Manchester and Birmingham, experience a significant increase in construction projects not seen since the last recession.

“We are seeing a wide variety of projects appearing across these regions, ranging from student accommodation and high rise residential buildings to infrastructure projects and hospitals,” Richard adds.

“Manchester seems to be establishing itself as one of the fastest growing European cities, where residential projects are at the forefront of construction,

The Travel Company Edinburgh The Travel Company Edinburgh has been proudly working with HTC Wolffkran Ltd since 2017, providing a complete booking service for its travel, including; rail, flights, hotels, car hire and meetings. The main elements to the success of managing its business has been to ensure that it receives the best rates and service possible provided by a dedicated team of travel professionals.

The Travel Company Edinburgh provides a personal service with professional account management, ensuring that clients’ budgets are managed in the best way with continually negotiating rates with suppliers, without compromising on quality.

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profile: HTC Wolffkran

while in Leeds it is a similar picture, with office space and student accommodation construction at high levels. Meanwhile, Birmingham continues to hit new heights through redevelopment and repurposing, with preparation for HS2 and the 2022 Commonwealth Games influencing the start of new projects.”

Customer service Following a slightly subdued first quarter of 2019 – which owes much of that to both the cyclical nature of the industry in the winter months and ongoing Brexit uncertainty – the company has seen a significant upturn in interest in the second quarter, and

with them. As such, we will carry on investing and adapting our fleet to meet demand.

Meanwhile, customer service will always be key, and we must ensure that we never lose sight of providing the best products and services possible.”

HTC Wolffkran www.wolffkran.com Services: Tower cranes, lifting equipment and accessories

with a sales pipeline that extends well into 2020, HTC Wolffkran can continue to tender for high profile projects with justified confidence.

“Since Wolffkran purchased the business back in 2015, it has gone from strength to strength,” Richard enthuses. “Our strategy going forward revolves around continuous improvement in all aspects of the business.

Our customers and their requirements are continually evolving and we must evolve

WHY BLOKCAM? We believe the crane is the heart of the construction site and understand the value in keeping the lifting crew safe and operational.

We improve communication between the operator and riggers using advanced transmitting and imaging technology.

We manufacture high quality, purpose-built hook mounted crane camera systems.

ABOUT BLOKCAM BlokCam is a wireless crane camera system that can be quickly and easily deployed to the hook block or boom tip of a crane. The sound and view from below the camera is then transmitted and received via the antenna systems to a screen in the cab.

This allows the operator to see and hear the load and surroundings, giving an unobstructed, live, audio-visual feed of the critical areas that working in the blind would never allow.

Additional crane cameras can be installed to monitor the hoist and luffing drum.

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profile: Collinson Construction

Modernising the industry Collinson Construction strives to transform the modular construction sector and facilitate the mass production of components by adopting best practices from other manufacturing industries

D

rawing inspiration from other sectors and their guiding principles is the way to modernise the construction industry.” These words belong to Sam Collinson, Managing Director of Collinson Construction—a company whose specialism lies in the creation of modular and tensile buildings.

“We are passionate proponents of what is referred to as the ‘common architecture’ approach in the automotive industry,” Sam states. “There is no doubt to us that modular construction is the future, but it currently comes

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at a premium, with the only benefit being a shorter on-site construction programme. This is because companies are generally creating modular factories as ‘indoor construction sites’, using the same construction processes and materials, and, essentially, standard methods and products.

Hence, you get the same quality as a traditional build, rather than a superior result.”

In Sam’s opinion, in order for volumetric modular construction to really work, a product needs to be built from the ground up, adopting best practices from other industries. “Car manufacturers,

and dare I say silo manufacturers, perfected the art of mass production long ago.”

When Collinson was first established in 1962, the company designed and manufactured bulk storage silos, applying the same ‘common architecture’ principles to the process.

Sam continues: “Now, the challenge is to bring the construction industry up to speed.

A step forward is that we are currently developing what we are calling volumetric modular common architecture construction (VMCA) by creating common components for our core platforms.

“We believe that once you have standardised the core architecture or components, you can then streamline the assembly methods, de-skill your workforce, and speed up the production process, to drive down the price and reduce the design and development time for each product or project,” says Sam. “In designing our components, we are looking to have parts that work across a range of products.

For example, we have 5 core ranges of silo with 130 different models and when you factor in model variants such as leg height and colour finish, there are well over 30,000 variations of what is

essentially the same product, as 90 per cent of the components are common across all silos. This holistic approach to designing product ranges using common componentry is what allows us to ensure our end product meets and exceeds customer expectations.”

Ultimately, Sam holds that customers are no longer keen on having too much choice in a construction project. He explains: “The fact that every building is unique may seem like a positive at first, but when you dig deeper and understand the sheer complexity of the project, you realise even a building could benefit from product design. Unlike traditional construction, which happens onsite, products are developed in a manufacturing environment where the margin for error is slim and the quality control is high. Therefore, we are openly challenging the idea that ‘bespoke’ always means ‘better’. A well-designed, precision-engineered building product manufactured offsite, with a number of carefully-curated customisation options, offers a far greater level of product certainty and assured quality, and a much simpler process for the customer.”

Collinson Construction’s product-led approach has given the company a reputation as both a tensile building and national sports facility specialist. Since it provides tensile fabric structures, the organisation has found a niche in the sports sector, and one of its primary offerings is a range of steel-framed superstructures named Challenger, Challenger+, and Evolution.

“Tensile structures like the Challenger are ideal for sport because most sports buildings do not need to be insulated, so they do not need ‘traditional’ roofs. By using a fabric membrane roof, you get natural light coming through. It’s like playing outdoors but without the bad weather,” Sam points out. “Although we do operate in other areas—including

education, commercial, and industrial—our experience when it comes to things like runoff, court sizes and roof clearance heights, is incredibly valuable in the sports sector.”

Project expertise What serves as compelling evidence of Collinson Construction’s capabilities is the delivery of Europe’s largest tensile sports facility – Dublin’s National Indoor Arena. Its length measuring at 230 metres and its width at 80 metres, the building features a full-sized football pitch, a halfsized rugby pitch, and an internal ancillary block dividing the two.

Sam gives an account of the challenges the company faced during the project and the innovative practices it employed.

“In total, there are 78 steel trusses at three-metre centres and because of the amount of steel involved, we had to use a small crane to build up at ground level and then lift elements into position using two 200-tonne cranes. The trusses were aligned at the apex and then bolted together to create the arched roof. Due to the wide spans, the roof fabric is heavier than what we would usually use, so we had to install it in four sections. As each section required a 20-hour window of little to no wind to be installed, we ran two working shifts. In the first, eight people would release the fabric cover before carrying out the initial tensioning to make the fabric secure. Then, the second team of six people would insert additional, fabric-securing steelwork and complete the tensioning process.

“Another major challenge was that our structure had to be built over the top of a very large building already being erected on the inside of the structure.

Effectively, we needed to envelope this internal block with a steel superstructure. This called for a detailed phasing of operations and detailed lift plans carried out by

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profile: Collinson Construction

our in-house team. In line with the plan, the trusses were lifted over the internal building and lowered onto the holding down bolts – a process that was repeated until the centre section of our structural framework had fully covered the internal building.”

Manufacturing investment Aiming to create a flexible workspace for large volumetric products, Collinson Construction recently invested £1.2 million in a new manufacturing facility adjacent to its main site. Making use of a large open space, the company introduced a bespoke widespan overhead crane to move modules around the whole factory and to load the transportation wagons.

“As far as designing modules or silos is concerned, we recently introduced structural analysis software called Finite Element Analysis (FEA),” Sam adds. “The system gives us a heat map of a structural part in 3D, enabling designers to see where components are likely to fail first. They can then modify the design in real-time before running the analysis again, repeating the process until the component is optimised to the desired safety factor.”

Sam also reveals that Collinson Construction is looking to bring a new automated cold-rolled steel processing line to its factory. “In essence, it will be a coil-fed punch press machine, which takes the cold-rolled steel in its most raw coil form and converts it into finished parts that have been punched to the desired flat shape complete with fixing holes. These are then robotically manipulated into an automatic press brake that will

bend the steel to the desired endproduct shape before stacking on to a pallet ready for assembly. It will amount to an investment of around £2.5 million, including the processing line, a storage system, and the building to house it all.

As part of the same project, we are also looking to upgrade our existing coil-fed line with a robotic bending cell to bring it up to the same spec as the new line.”

Earlier in 2019, Collinson Construction assumed its own brand identity, with the wider Collinson group demerging its

agricultural and construction businesses. Allowing both divisions the space to continue growing and to be more strategic and more focused, the demerger will facilitate the achievement of Collinson Construction’s target to reach a £30 million turnover in the next three years.

Sam concludes: “We are starting to engage more with frameworks and tendered work.

More important, though, is our approach to offsite construction, which really gives us a competitive edge and enables us to offer our own products. Going forward, we will focus on self-delivery, the aim being to self-deliver as much of a project as possible, and whenever it’s not possible, to use only our trusted technical partners and supply chain.”

Collinson Construction www.collinsonconstruction.co.uk Services: Construction of modular and tensile buildings

BEST-HALL Best-Hall has designed, manufactured and installed fabric-covered buildings for 45 years. The company’s highly skilled professionals have set up 5000 buildings, most of which are in Europe, with materials of the highest quality available. In cooperation with Collinson Construction, Best-Hall has completed more than 70 projects in the UK and Ireland. Best-Hall has had the honour of being involved in impressive sports hall projects that have served to promote sports hobbies among children and young people.

The factory is located in Finland and all materials are of European origin. All Best-Hall structures have been granted the CE mark as confirmation that the company’s operations adhere to the EN-1090 standard. Best-Hall also has a certified ISO 9001 quality management system, ISO 45001 occupational health and safety system, and ISO 14001 environmental management system. In other words, Best-Hall focuses on high quality work and the well-being of its staff and the environment.

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profile: Voltcom

A better

future is here Voltcom’s versatility enables the electrical engineering construction company to operate in a range of areas, including the delivery of medium and high-voltage power line projects, asset management, and front line services

H

eadquartered in the town of Llantrisant, just under 15 miles away from the Welsh capital Cardiff, Voltcom Group is a well-known provider of electrical supply equipment and medium and high-voltage power line projects.

The company’s core business unit – Voltcom Construction – is specialised in catering for the power industry’s needs for erection, wiring, refurbishment, and dismantling of all types of overhead power lines and any other structures of any voltage.

Over the years, the division has also expanded into access infrastructure, in order to support its overhead line primary industry.

While acting as a principal contractor operating under the requirements of CDM Regulations 2007, Voltcom has also begun

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contracting directly to Distribution Network Operators on both the distribution and transmission networks – from live low voltage to EHV transmission. At the same time, the business has maintained a decisive sub-contracting role to the likes of Balfour Beatty, AMEC, and Babcock International, having worked on both overhead line National Grid Energy Alliances on EHV projects.

With a view to help companies that require instant, real-time insight into their compliance status and to support them in evaluating all of their employees against a role profile, Voltcom has developed a revolutionary tool called Voltcom Vision. The quality compliance system excels in that it enables organisations with large teams of workers to track, communicate, and manage their people, regardless of where

they are. It allows real-time understanding of the training records of every individual, what they are authorised to do, what qualifications need updating or renewing, what special skills and abilities they have, and if there are any areas for development that need to be addressed. As such, the Voltcom Vision system contributes massively to each and every user’s performance.

Extremely easy to use, it can be seamlessly integrated with existing systems to provide all the immediate visibility and analysis that any company would require.

Essentially, Voltcom’s dynamic product is capable of assessing individual competences, thus becoming an indispensable tool in giving management assurance that the right people are in the right roles and in the right place. By doing so, it proves

that harmonising the office/ fieldworker divide does not have to be a painful or costly process.

For Voltcom to guarantee the most efficient solution, different packages are available, depending on the size and the needs of users who range from global franchises to the smallest of contractors.

For years on end, Voltcom Construction has been building an impeccable and demonstrable health and safety record, which is supported by the company’s OHSAS 18001 system. Taking its corporate social responsibility to heart, the company follows a number of policies and procedures to ensure the protection of its staff and the general public.

What is more, it is committed to continuously improving its environmental performance, making it a key priority from the very earliest stages of design, through to the completion of the construction, commissioning, and developing into future projects.

Environmental solutions are a forefront requirement and these considerations are managed and maintained within the Voltcom Group structure as a supporting element and innovation for Voltcom Construction.

The company has also embraced sustainability as the concept that drives the senior management team’s decisions, having identified it as an opportunity to encourage innovation, increase investment, and open up new markets.

With rising energy and waste costs, tougher environmental legislation, and higher stakeholder expectations, organisations are increasingly focusing their attention on improving production practices to both enhance performance and demonstrate responsible behaviour, and Voltcom does not make an exception. Improved resource productivity is seen as holding the potential to drive down costs by reducing raw material

use, waste, and pollution, thus saving companies the trouble ensuing from failing to manage environmental risks properly.

Despite regulation becoming ever so stringent, Voltcom has realised that it will not be able to single-handedly deliver the changes everyone wants to see. As a result, the company is showing proactivity in using the levers available in a consistent way throughout its relationships with clients, sub-contractors, employees, the public sector, and the community.

Investing in its electrical engineering, construction, and service skills has proven a working tactic for Voltcom, with the development of Voltcom Vision only a fraction of the company’s recent expenditures.

As a matter of the fact, the past

12 months have seen Voltcom invest a staggering £15 million in improving its operational capabilities. Having got familiar with the business’ ways, there is no reason to doubt that it will keep its conscientiousness, going forward and continue to introduce new technologies when needed, so that it stays ahead of the curve in the years to come. Should this be the case, Voltcom will remain an ambassador of a safe and innovative service delivery, for which care for customers, workforce, and the environment is the utmost priority.

Voltcom www.voltcomgroup.com Services: Contractor services to the UK electricity transmission and distribution market

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profile: Andrew Scott

Long tradition of excellence Andrew Scott is one of the UK’s oldest independent construction companies, whose expertise covers a wide range of sectors, including public and private infrastructure, education, health and wellbeing, commercial, industrial, and residential

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ery few British construction companies command the same level of universal respect within the civil engineering and construction communities as Andrew Scott. Established in 1870, the Welsh company is getting ready to celebrate its 150th anniversary next year and there does not seem to be a better time for the business to reach this milestone. Andrew Scott has been going from strength to strength as of late, achieving an impressive 54 per cent growth last year, winning new contracts, and capping its overall progress off with the reception of the prestigious ‘Construction Company of the Year’ award at Insider’s Wales Property Awards 2019.

The latter accomplishment is a strong indicator of the reliable team Andrew Scott has assembled and it is no wonder that the company recognises its staff as its best asset. The majority of Andrew Scott’s workforce has been part of the organisation for a long time, embodying the company’s passion and commitment to understanding the local markets and the requirements of the customers.

What is more, Andrew Scott takes

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its role as a major local employer seriously and it provides an exciting and supportive environment, in which individuals can achieve their full potential.

For many years, the company has run a structured development plan for those just leaving school, modern apprentices, graduates, and senior managers, as well as encouraging CPD for all of its staff.

Priding itself on regularly creating

trade apprenticeship opportunities, which is a way of learning a NVQ construction skill at college whilst gaining supervised work experience at the same time, Andrew Scott also works in tight collaboration with two Welsh specialist apprentice organisations – Cyfle and Y-Prentis.

These help the company by linking their registered apprentices to work placement opportunities with its onsite specialist contractors.

Just how much an apprenticeship at Andrew Scott can change an individual’s life is reflected in that some of the business’ best project managers have started their career as apprentices and have, over time, progressed through the ranks to senior positions, running their own construction projects. Notably, the company is now eager to expand its undertakings in the area and reach out to young women who are interested in developing a career in construction.

To this end, one of the most recent initiatives organised by Andrew Scott, was to invite 30 schoolgirls to the ongoing The Wave project in Bristol on 21 June, in celebration of the International Women in Engineering Day. On site, the Year 9 female pupils from The Castle School in Thornbury were given a tour of the unique and high-tech inland surfing facility.

In addition, they heard valuable personal insights from Andrew Scott’s female employees and their experiences within the construction industry.

As it was briefly highlighted above, the business has won and is currently working on a lot of prestigious contracts. Throughout its history, Andrew Scott has specialised in the construction of roads, bridges, schools, and even sports stadiums. Its offering also includes refurbishment of existing buildings and much of this accumulated experience has been key to the success of the schemes the company has been involved in.

A remarkable manifestation of Andrew Scott’s capabilities was the construction of Bristol’s first new bridge in 50 years. The 91-metre, S-shaped Castle Bridge opened to public in 2017, linking Castle Park and Hawkins Lane. The structure is topped with timber decking, sculptured cladding, and feature lighting, and what is more noteworthy about the way it was built, is that its piled foundations, concrete structure, and 20-tonne steel sections were all placed

via jack-up barges and floating pontoons.

Right now, Andrew Scott’s order book consists of contracts that range from £1 million to £23 million in value. Among the most important projects that it is delivering at present, is the building of a new facility for Thames Hospice in Windsor. Having realised the need to create a purpose-built building to cope with the needs of the increasing number of people who need care and service, Thames Hospice appointed Andrew Scott at the end of 2018 and construction began in January this year.

The new hospice will include 28 patient rooms with en-suites and space for family to stay overnight, a new Day Therapy Centre, which will enable Thames Hospice to double its day service provision, a new Education Centre, a gym, an open

reception area and café, eight acres of wheelchair-friendly gardens, and free parking for visitors. It is projected that the site will be completed and open in 2020.

While these two projects are a very small sample of Andrew Scott’s broad portfolio, they perfectly demonstrate the company’s vision to differentiate itself based on quality, innovation, best value, and professional service.

Going forward, the business will remain focused on training and incentivising its employees, and growing new talent, in order to ensure that it continues to thrive in the years to come.

Andrew Scott www.andrewscott.co.uk Services: Building and civil engineering construction company

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profile: Billy Bowie

I

n 1991, Billy Bowie started his company with only one

vehicle – a Ford D-Series tanker. Twenty-eight years and millions of pounds of investment later, Billy Bowie Special Projects is one of

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the biggest and best waste management service providers in the UK. Currently, the company’s fleet is made up of more than 140 commercial vehicles and 80 trailers, including vacuum tankers from 10 m³ to 33 m³, DISAB

vacuum loaders, JHL Flexline jet vac units, Simon Moos dewatering units, walking floor trailers, hook loaders, and chain lift skip vehicles.

Alongside its main depot located in Kilmarnock, Billy Bowie has three more operating facilities

Dedicated to a cleaner environment Billy Bowie works tirelessly to optimise its processes, so that the leading waste management services provider operates in the most environmentally-friendly way possible

– in Widnes (Cheshire), Leeds (North Yorkshire), and Ecclesfield (South Yorkshire), whence it offers its range of waste management services pertaining to domestic septic tank desludging, haulage of non-hazardous liquid waste,

as well as dry and wet waste services. “We also have a transfer station facility at our head office in Kilmarnock and we provide our services to domestic customers, local authorities, major utilities, and multinational blue-chip

companies,� Operations Director, Alisdair Clark points out.

Septic tank desludging is provided for domestic households with private septic tanks throughout the UK. The flexible 24/7/365 service allows

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profile: Billy Bowie

for scheduled, unscheduled and urgent response call-out for septic tank requirements, with desludging usually taking place within 24 hours of request. Billy Bowie also works with major hotel chains in Scotland to assess and service

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their waste management needs.

Following the clean of a septic tank, the waste is transported to a licenced treatment facility for further processing.

As part of its dry waste services, Billy Bowie offers

comprehensive container supply and transportation, using demountables, slave tanks, and commercial skips suitable for sand removal, digesters, grit, and solids up to 225mm in size.

Alisdair makes a note that through its transfer facility, the company can separate all dry waste, thus making the discarding process more environmentally-friendly and allowing for recycling of particular materials to occur. “The transfer station is where we bring all dry materials such as wood, brick, and rubble, and we separate it all through a picking line. The waste is then put onto a moving conveyor belt where dust and soil are separated, before the staff on the picking line pick out wood, brick, metal, glass and other solid items and separate it all into specific containers. Paper

the country’s biggest landfill and recycling operators and we are their sole contractor for removing all of their wet waste,” Alisdair explains.

Investment in different types of vehicle units has also helped Billy

and cardboard are graded and baled ready for safe distribution to mills, while timber is graded and shredded into wood shavings.

These wood shavings have many uses such as feedstock for the onsite in-vessel composting facility or they can be used for chipboard manufacture. Zero waste to landfill is a big topic in Scotland at the moment and we are trying to send as little to landfill as possible.”

Bowie diversify its proposition, allowing it to take on various specialist service projects. “We used to deliver only specialist tanker services at the beginning, but we do so many other things now that we can undertake all sorts of projects. For example,

Assorted vehicle units Billy Bowie also handles wet waste, described by Alisdair as “any non-hazardous liquids, such as wastewater from landfill sites, which is taken away for treatment and disposal.” In fact, one of the company’s major contracts is for its wet waste management services. “We work with FCC Environment, which is one of

GK&N Services GK&N Services is the specialist in designing, manufacturing and supplying drainage and tanker equipment. With over 20 years’ industry experience, our solutions are trusted by councils, water authorities and contractors across the UK. Our in-house manufacturing service covers jetters, tankers, vactors and road rail tankers, and we respond to all repair requests in 24 hours, ensuring you’re always operational again as soon as possible.

Try our online shop, packed full of quality equipment, from hoses, fittings and accessories, to jets, pipes and drain rods. We stock a range of safety equipment and drainage maintenance equipment.

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profile: Billy Bowie

we can do demolition works or we can offer vacuum excavation where we dig up the ground without using buckets or shovels, so that we can protect any delicate pipework or cables whose position underground is unknown,” Alisdair maintains.

“Utilising machines like the DISAB vacuum loaders and the JHL Flexlines, in particular, have broadened our skills significantly.

We currently have six DISAB units across the country, which enable vacuum tankers to operate using long hoses for difficult to reach areas and remote locations to be accessed and serviced successfully,” he continues. “You can lay out half a mile of hose and they will suck it up. Out in the country, we have some septic tanks that are totally inaccessible.

You may have to lay out up to 300

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metres of hose to get to them.

They are also used on industrial plants where you may not have access inside, so the hose has to go in with the machine sitting outside.”

Fleet renewal All of Billy Bowie’s units make use of Euro 5 & 6 engines and energy-saving technology, highlighting the company’s commitment to improving its environmental credentials, lowering its carbon footprint, and reducing the amount of fuel it uses. “Our comprehensive environmental policy is accredited with ISO 14001:2015 and in 2009, we became the first company in Scotland to win the ‘Environmental Haulier of the Year’ award presented by The Scottish Transport News. We

proudly display it in our head office reception, together with our company slogan ‘Dedicated to a Cleaner Environment’, which also features on every one of our trucks,” Alisdair notes.

“We have introduced a fleet renewal policy, which sees the bulk of our fleet replaced every five to six years, to keep ourselves at the forefront of environmental efficiency. In addition, we instil the ethos of environmental awareness in our staff, too,” he adds. “For instance, eco-driving skills are taught as standard. We educate drivers on fuel-efficient driving techniques and we employed an in-house driver trainer, with a view to reduce fuel usage and our overall carbon footprint.”

Billy Bowie also relies on digital technology to monitor its fuel use and reduce it, where

possible. “Unfortunately, we use a lot of fuel, because many of our vacuum tankers are PTOdriven, so we need to have the engine running in the truck while we are running the units,” Alisdair says. “The ‘artics’ are fitted with a tracking system that tells us if the truck is idling and if it is, it also tells us whether the PTO is engaged or not. In a case when the truck is in an idle state and not having its PTO engaged, we can contact the driver and get it switched off.

Furthermore, our vehicles have modern manufacturer-fitted systems that also monitor idle time and driving efficiency to make further savings. As a result of their operation, we have seen an improvement of about five per cent in fuel efficiency.”

For Billy Bowie, its employees are true ambassadors for the company. In recognition of their hard work and effort, it takes good care of the workforce, running a series of internal training programmes on topics like environmental awareness and health and safety. What is more, the service provider is also

demonstrate clearly that, for Billy Bowie, supporting its clients in their own activities is priority number one.

Billy Bowie https://billybowietankers.co.uk Services: Waste management services

working closely with the Glasgow Training Group to roll out Driver CPC courses throughout the business to ensure that all drivers are kept fully compliant.

Maintaining a partnership approach in its customer relations is a clear characteristic of Billy Bowie. In order to ensure its efficient continuation, the company conducts regular meetings to discuss all areas of the business. For the parties’ mutual benefit, all drivers are now provided with incident forms to report any accidents or near-misses that may occur, and this information is provided to the client in a monthly report.

To complement this, thanks to vehicle tracking, drivers’ location can be identified and shared with customers at any time. These are just two examples, which

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profile: Lafarge Cement

Cementing its sustainable future Having started manufacturing cement itself relatively recently, Lafarge Cement – part of Aggregate Industries – is introducing a range of lower embodied carbon products, highlighting its commitment to reducing its environmental impact

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p until 2015, Aggregate Industries was known for importing cement into the UK. It was in that year, though, that the company inherited an expertise in cement manufacturing. Following the merger between Lafarge and Holcim Group (of which Aggregate Industries has been part since 2005), the cement supplier acquired two manufacturing plants – in Cauldon, Staffordshire and Cookstown, County Tyrone in Northern Ireland, to add to its network of import terminals. Due to its existing association with the Cauldon and Cookstown sites, Lafarge Cement was selected as the brand name to be used by Aggregate Industries for its cement manufacturing business.

“We have five import terminals across the UK – in Belfast, in Glasgow, at Ellesmere Port, in Plymouth, and in Chatham. Combining these facilities with the new manufacturing sites has enabled us to establish a strong nationwide presence that allows us to fulfil all of our own needs, while serving an external customer base, too,” begins Steve Curley, Commercial Director at Lafarge Cement.

Although stepping into the world of cement manufacturing represented a completely new venture for the company, Lafarge Cement hit the ground running, making the most of its newly-

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profile: Lafarge Cement

acquired plants’ long-standing expertise. “It is important to note that last year the Cookstown facility celebrated its 50th anniversary and in 2017, the Cauldon plant marked 60 years of operation. This goes to show that both have plenty of experience in the cement manufacturing field and the reputation they have built in the market is certainly beyond reproach. On our part, we are extremely respectful of their heritage and we fully recognise how important they have been to their respective local communities as providers of employment,” Steve comments.

Carbon reduction As part of the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), Lafarge Cement’s facilities are among the 14,000 installations that must monitor and report their carbon emissions. Launched in 2005

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Projects like HS2, programmes around energy and nuclear new builds, as well as potential airport expansions will create a lot of demand for products like ours, as they are all projects that will require a lot of concrete and, therefore, a lot of cement as a measure against global warming, the EU ETS is the biggest emissions trading scheme in the world, working on a ‘cap and trade’ principle where each installation is allocated only a certain amount of greenhouse gases it can emit. “If you go beyond that limit, you have to purchase carbon credits, in order to make up for the extra CO2 emissions your installation has produced,” explains Steve.

“One of the major challenges

for everyone in our industry is that, in the past two years, the price of carbon emitted has increased almost five-fold,” he continues. “As a result, we are now working tirelessly to reduce our emissions per tonne of final product and there are two ways in which we are working to achieve that.

“Firstly, we are now on a path that will see us develop our product portfolio to include products with lower embodied carbon. All cement plants produce a product called clinker, which is the raw material you use to make cement,” Steve discusses. “The key point is that the amount of carbon you produce is directly linked to the amount of clinker you produce.

Therefore, our idea is to blend the clinker with various other materials, so that we can use less of it per tonne of finished product.”

Innovative products Lafarge Cement’s adjusted approach first featured in its hydraulic road binder TerraCem, which was launched last year.

“With it, we are specifically targeting the soil stabilisation market,” says Steve. “It is a blend of clinker and ground limestone which is ideally suited for this purpose. Traditionally, soil stabilisation has used clinkeronly (CEM I) products, but the blended mix (CEM II) TerraCem can not only match their performance, but also offer lower embodied carbon, which makes it a more environmentally-friendly option.”

Two more products – Landscape and Endure, are set to be launched by the end of 2019.

Steve details their characteristics: “As the name suggests, Landscape aims to make a breakthrough in the landscaping and precast markets. Again, it is a product that mixes clinker with finely ground limestone and, just like TerraCem, it has a reduced amount of embodied carbon.

Among its other benefits is its lighter colour, which means that less pigment is needed to create a coloured product; improved cohesion minimises the bleeding effect of the concrete; and it is able to facilitate an improved surface finish.

“Endure is a blend of clinker and PFA (pulverised fuel ash) and its main property is that it enhances the durability of the concrete dramatically.

In addition, the product has improved resistance to sulphates in the ground, and therefore is suitable for aggressive ground conditions.”

New opportunities Together with introducing new products that have lower embodied carbon, Lafarge Cement has also taken to streamlining the overall operation of its plants as a means to

keep its carbon impact within manageable levels. “Both the Cauldon and Cookstown sites have increased their use of alternative fuels. For instance, they now utilise things like chipped tyres and pelletised sewage that would otherwise go to landfill. Our intention to use alternative fuels is clear, and we continue to invest in ways to support this. This includes the establishment of a company called Geocycle to analyse waste streams and secure sources of alternative fuels,” Steve reveals.

He is also keen to point out Lafarge Cement’s ongoing commitment to health and safety. “We start every year with a Back to Work Day where we stop all operations across the entire company and focus on outlining our health and safety focus areas for the year ahead.

This year, we will lead quarterly campaigns on each of these – in Q1 we have focused on reviewing our isolation procedures, in Q2 we are looking at our approach to risk management, while in Q3 and Q4, we will be analysing our practices regarding workplace transport, and work at height and in confined spaces. In addition, we also run a scheme called ‘Healthy You’ where we strive to offer any kind of support to our employees and, as of late, our efforts have been directed mainly at dealing with mental health-related issues.”

The development of new infrastructure in the UK has evidently taken priority in the considerations of the Government and major businesses alike, which, for Steve, signifies the opening up of a multitude of opportunities for Lafarge Cement. “Projects like HS2, programmes around energy and nuclear new builds, as well as potential airport expansions will create a lot of demand for products like ours, as they are all projects that will require a lot of concrete and, therefore, a lot of cement. This is why we see the next few years as being bright for us and for the industry as a whole, and we are positive about the future in terms of market demand,” he concludes.

Lafarge Cement www.aggregate.com/our-businesses/ lafarge-cement Services: Manufacture and supply of cement, GGBS, fly ash, and specialist cementitious materials 51

profile: Bell Contracting

Embracing change For over five decades, Bell Contracting has shown itself to be undaunted by the changing nature of the construction industry, a trait that has seen it remain at the heart of the massive success achieved by the KW Bell Group

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To find out how Marshalls CPM can offer speedy installation with either no or minimum on-site fabrications please visit our website or call our team

T: 01179 814500 E: salesemail@marshalls.co.uk W: www.cpm-group.com

profile: Bell Contracting

K

W Bell Group, one of the UK’s most successful construction companies of the last 50 years, is no stranger to the pages of Construction & Civil Engineering, having been profiled on several occasions in the past. In each previous instance the focus has been on the collective efforts of its four divisions – Bell Homes, Bell Plant, Bell Partnerships and Bell Contracting – however, when we had the pleasure of speaking with Group Director Peter Bell in May 2019, the spotlight was trained on the latter division, Bell Contracting.

Founded 51 years ago by Peter’s father Keith Bell, the business began life through his work as a solo bricklayer. In the decades that followed, Bell Contracting would diversify its service offering to the point that it would become a leading specialist in groundwork and civil engineering for the house building industry, and one that was this year listed in The Sunday Times Profit Track 2019 league table. “In addition to being the longest-running area of the KW Bell Group, Bell Contracting is also the biggest in terms of size, achieving a turnover of around £50 million per year,” Peter – also Bell Contracting’s Managing Director – explains.

Operating across the South West of England and South Wales, where it works with a large client base which includes five of top ten house builders in the UK, Bell Contracting today boasts a workforce of almost 500 highly

To date, we have purchased 20 cabbed dumpers, which provide a ROPS/FOPS and SIPS structure to protect the operator. These dumpers represent the way we are changing the way we operate these vehicles on sites

Nicola Bird and Peter Bell

skilled operatives. The size of the business means that it is capable of carrying out the best part of 30 contracts at any one time, and at the time of speaking to Peter it was in possession of a full order book of work taking it through to May 2020. Peter expects that by the end of this calendar year that order book will be filled to the point where the company will have a full plate until May 2021.

Total consistency So, what has been the secret to the company’s success? For Peter, it ties into a rather unique compliment he was paid just over a decade ago. “It was back then that a good friend of mine

proclaimed that we were a lot like a tin of Heinz Baked Beans in that we do exactly what it says on the tin,” he cheerfully states. “Now, while it would perhaps be more glamorous to be compared with say a bottle of Dom Pérignon, the message this comment sends it that it has always been about ensuring the consistency of our offering. This relates to the bidding process, the work of our site delivery teams, our customer service and aftercare, and most importantly of all health and safety.”

Of course, one can’t ignore the fact that, these days, price is also a key driver, but alongside that comes the need to build up the right client base, and the ability to constantly reinvent oneself in order to stay fresh and appealing to customers. Peter and the rest of the Bell Contracting family are well aware of this, and with contributing factors such as the regular introduction of new technologies and the skills gap that currently exists within the industry in mind, they are constantly looking for improved ways of delivering the end product.

“Over the last 18 months or so, we have invested the best part of £2 million into a mix of new technologies, methodologies and training, which we are very excited about,” Peter enthuses.

“For starters, we have spent over £800,000 on satellite 3D modeling excavator control systems. These systems allow us to receive designs and AutoCAD drawings from our clients’

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The company supplies a vast range of sustainable precast products to every sector of construction industry, fully supported by its experienced technical and engineering teams.

With production facilities across the UK and a network of specialist distributors, Marshalls CPM has built long-term partnerships with both customers and suppliers, including major contractors, highway, rail and water companies, and has a comprehensive catalogue of products including pipes, manholes (both tradition and sealed manholes), box culverts, wastewater, flood and stormwater management products, and sustainable drainage systems.

The Marshalls CPM BBA approved Redi-Rock modular walling system is an ingenious, space saving solution for retaining, force protection, landscaping and flood protection applications.

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profile: Bell Contracting

engineers, which we plug directly into our excavators on site that carry out the groundworks as per an individual project’s specifications. This helps to cut down on labour costs, reduces the need for peg bashing, and creates a better, quicker, safer way of carrying out complex works.”

Investing in equipment The theme of health and safety comes up again when Peter details another important investment. “To date, we have purchased 20 cabbed dumpers, which provide a ROPS/FOPS and SIPS structure to protect the operator,” he says. “These dumpers represent the way we are changing the way we operate these vehicles on sites.

We believe that far too many people in our industry use dumpers as something of a wheelbarrow that can be abused.

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We want to transform this attitude and enhance the levels of professionalism on site by appointing designated operators to these trucks. In doing so, we also want to create a safer environment for managing earth on site, and that is where these new cabbed dumpers come in.

“Equally exciting for us is the recent purchase of two vacuum excavators, at a cost of £320,000. As an industry, we are a big culprit when it comes to cable strikes, which are usually caused by mini-excavators and have the potential to cause series injuries, or even fatalities.

Our vacuum excavators, and the way they operate by sucking up granular materials and surface tarmac, will allow us to visit active sites and carry out work on live service pits in a fast, safe manner, making cable strikes a thing of the past.”

Proving that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree when it comes to making the business future ready, Peter’s daughter Nicola Bird – Bell Contracting’s Safety and Business Development Director – has spent the last two years spearheading a bespoke groundworks apprenticeship scheme like no other. “This apprenticeship, which has been developed in conjunction with a sub-contracted training provider, sees us linked with both The Heart of Worchester College and Vale College. Where the scheme differs from most is in the fact that students do not attend the colleges themselves, instead working from our two training hubs – one at our head office in Cinderford and the other in Cardiff – where they consolidate their theoretical and practical learning.

“Building upon Nicola’s efforts, we will soon be putting in a request for planning permission for a new technology-based construction centre and training academy on land that we have acquired opposite our head office. Working with universities and colleges within a 50-mile radius, we want

further increases in turnover and profitability in the coming years, all while taking care of all of our existing clients,” Peter concludes.

“After all, for us it is not about the top line, it is about the bottom line!”

Bell Contracting www.bellcontracting.co.uk Services: Groundwork and civil engineering for the house building industry

this centre to be at the heart of our efforts to take a fresh approach to competency, and to ultimately make a telling contribution to addressing the undersupply of groundwork and civil engineering training in the UK.” Turning back to Bell Contracting itself, Peter’s focus at present is on consolidating the success of the business and ensuring that it continues to deliver the services, customer care and professionalism that its existing clients expect of it. In the meantime, his forwardthinking mindset means that he continues to promote people from within the business with succession planning in mind.

“Through a combination of our people, new technologies and methodologies, and an embracing of cultural changes, we believe it to be possible to achieve

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profile: Forterra

Paving the way forward

F

Offering one of the widest ranges of building products, Forterra has supplied these to numerous residential and commercial developments across the UK

orterra’s position as one of the largest manufacturers of building products in the UK comes with the responsibility to make sure that Britain keeps building. Operating from 18 manufacturing sites, the company creates bricks, blocks, precast concrete, paving, and many other vital products, and it is very likely that at any given moment you are near a building or structure made using Forterra products. The organisation’s broad portfolio includes London Brick, Thermalite, Formpave, Cradley, Red Bank, and Jetfloor. What is more, Forterra added Bison Precast to its list of brands in 2017, effectively doubling its precast concrete production.

What can rightly be seen as the jewel in Forterra’s crown is the legendary London Brick, of which the company is the sole manufacturer. Nearly a quarter of the UK’s housing stock contains London Brick, which has been in production since 1877, but

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whose heyday came in the postwar years when hundreds of thousands of new houses were built. In 1984, Forterra acquired London Brick and, today, the range is produced almost exclusively for the residential renovation, maintenance, and improvement market. It includes 23 bricks and offers a variety of colours and textures – from a classic rustic red through to yellows and buffs.

Another range in Forterra’s catalogue that deserves special mention is Ecostock. Regarded as the most environmentallyfriendly brick range in the UK, it is manufactured at the company’s Measham factory where the latest technology in sustainability and production efficiency is used to make stock bricks with low embodied energy, advanced colour consistency, and dimensional accuracy. Ecostock bricks are available with a pressed or thrown finish and are suitable for all domestic and commercial applications.

The Carillions housing development, situated close to the heart of Wokingham town, provides a good example of the application of the Ecostock range as represented by the Chelsea Smoked Red brick. Designed to fit in with the area’s rural charm and surrounding red-brick structures, aesthetic consideration was a key element in the plans for this site.

Therefore, the Chelsea Smoked Red brick offered the perfect balance in terms of its structural properties and red colouration.

Tarnished with blackened flashes, the brick gives each house an earthly character that naturally correlates with the established woodland neighbouring the site. Used as a facing brick, the Chelsea Smoked Red was combined with another of Forterra’s bricks – Dark Moroccan Smooth, whose role as a feature brick was to add dimension to some of the properties.

Towards the end of 2018, Forterra’s Bison Precast launched its latest cost-effective alternative

to traditional building methods at the Offsite Construction Show in London. The Brick Faced Sandwich Panels are made by factory fitting brick finishes onto precast concrete panels and are ideally suited to multi-storey structures in residential and commercial use developments.

Forterra has one of the largest selections of facing bricks in the UK, which can be seamlessly specified and utilised with the panels, making their manufacture particularly efficient and it is hoped that this system may help address ongoing trade shortages in the on-site labour market.

The panels, which are an extension of Bison Precast’s cross wall frames, are cast with bricks placed within them, can be suitable for direct decoration, and can also be manufactured with other features such as cast-in electricity conduits, plug sockets, and even glazed windows, reducing the need for on-site labour during the build.

greater number of women taking up roles in the construction sector.

Back to Forterra’s internal affairs, exciting news was announced in April, as the company revealed it had been given the green light to commence a £95 million project that will double the production capacity of its Desford plant. The end goal of the programme is to turn the site into the largest and most efficient brick factory in Europe, its output reaching 180 million bricks annually. This will be achieved via the construction of a new, modern facility with stateof-the-art automated processes that will minimise the plant’s environmental impact. The new premises is expected to open in 2022 and will be built alongside the existing factory, ensuring the latter remains operational, in order

to maintain production during the changeover.

This imminent expansion is a cue for Forterra’s ambitious take on the future. Sustainable year-on-year growth has filled the company with the belief that Britain’s construction industry will remain strong, hence the need for an increased production of high-quality bricks. Sporting a track record of market consolidation, which has seen the business acquire multiple other organisations and develop a broad portfolio of products, Forterra continues to build its solid legacy.

Forterra www.forterra.co.uk Services: Building products manufacture

£95 million project Calls for gender equality all over Britain’s business community certainly did not sweep past Forterra. The company grabbed the headlines right at the start of 2019 when it organised Bricklaying Forterra Females (BFF) – the UK’s first all-female bricklaying competition, which was held in March as part of a wider construction skills day at Havering College in Essex. The brand-new national competition aims to find the best female student bricklayers in the country, thus encouraging more girls and women to consider careers in bricklaying or construction.

Four Junior and Senior female bricklaying students currently at colleges in England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland entered the competition and there is an uninhibited sense of optimism that initiatives of this kind will gradually lead to a

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