Award Magazine V310

$14.95

Volume 3 Number 10

Inside This Edition: Melbourne Airport's T2 Expansion Australian Made: The Push for Local Building Supplies Working with Heritage Buildings Active Landscaping, Wayfinding & More...

POINT A A C C E S S C O N S U L T I N G C O S T P T N E M E G A N A M R O P E R T Y M A N A G E M E N T B U I L D

E S P R O P E R T Y S E R V I C C I E V S R C E E S R E R U T C U R T S A T I R F F I N C I A G T N I I I N G S E R V E Y O N S E R N O I T A C I F I C E P S S E C I V S E R V I C E S U R B A N P L A N N I N G

POINT B

LEADING YOU TO A NEW DESTINATION The current operating environment has forced everyone to change their tack. The standard directions are no longer applicable to an industry that is demanding innovation, improved practices and an ability to find new ways to get to point B. So while our eyes are still firmly fixed on where you need to be, our Access Consulting team is creating environments for accessing life.

Access Consulting | Project Management | Cost Management | Building Surveying | Urban Planning Specification Consulting | Infrastructure Services | Property Consultancy | Certification Services

www.davislangdon.com

Blythe-Sanderson Group is part of Davis Langdon

contents Feature SUPPLEMENTs COVER IMAGE: Ballast Point Park, Sydney

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12

Active Landscaping

17

The Case for Retrofits and Restorations

18

Working with Heritage Buildings

20

The Future of Australian Landscaping

Assistant Editor | Lieu Thi Pham

22

Wayfinding: Negotiating Complex spaces

Contributing Writers | Andrew Holder, Brooke Barr, Caroline Ostrowski, Emily Dane, George Xinos, Helen Jacobs, Jim Barrett, Kayt Watts, Lieu Pham, Mark Kenfield, Matthias Krups, Natalie Carter, Paul Hayes, Paul Mcleod, Paul Mutton, Romilly Madew, Sarah Bachmann, Sonya Ku.

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The March of Technology

Volume 3 Number 10 Publisher | Brandon Vigon 03 8844 5822 ext. 112 publisher@awardmagazine.com.au Editor | Mark Kenfield editor@awardmagazine.com.au

Marketing | Matilde Ejlertsen Senior Designer | Annette Carlucci Production Manager | Rachel Selbie

Australian Made: Australian Designed Australian Built

AWARDWORTHY SHOWCASES

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CMI Toyota, SA

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Costco Docklands, VIC

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Melbourne Airport T2 Expansion, VIC

Circulation | subscriptions@awardmagazine.com.au

How Did They Do That?

Award Magazine is published by:

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MediaEdge Communication Australia Chapel Street North, South Yarra VIC 3141 T: 03 8844 5822 F: 03 9824 1188 www.mediaedge.ca

Straight Talk

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Steeling the Show: Australian Pavilion, Shanghai Expo 2010

Straight Talk Megan Motto, CEO Consult Australia

President | Kevin Brown Subscription Rates: (includes gst) Aud: 1 year, $49.95; 2 years, $89.95 Single Copy Sales: (includes gst) AUD: $14.95 New Zealand: $19.95 Reprints: For information on article reprints or reproductions, please contact the publisher at: publisher@awardmagazine.com.au Editorial suggestion/submission: Do you have a story idea, or would like to submit editorial for publishing consideration, please e-mail editorial@awardmagazine.com.au Š Copyright 2010 Australia Post Publications Mail Pub. No. PP381712102392

PROFESSIONAL Columns

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Legal: Contract Risk Management

30

Technology: The Airvolution of technology

42

Accessibility: But it’s Existing

MARKET Analysis

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36

The Building Market 2010/2011 State & Sector and Breakdown

18 Industry Matters

21 The Benefits of Certifying Sustainable Timber

34 GECA Announces New Building Product Standards

Association Matters

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43 Green Retrofits: Do you Have the Energy?

43 ACA is Dedicated to Improving Safety Performance

44 $350,000 For the Australian National Engineering Taskforce

44 Precast Offers Best Cost Performance

Feature PRODUCT SHOWCASEs

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Textural Glass Cydonia The Glass Studio

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Automatic Door Operators DORMA

editorial advisors and supporters

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Australian made

Australian Designed Australian Built The building sector is acknowledged as an important driver of economic activity. This is the upside of the cost excesses now being reported in the contract arrangements of the Federal Government’s Building the Education Revolution (BER).

It is also a major consumer of Australian made products.

Certainly, the economic impact of building on the broader economy is maximised when the Australian content in buildings is maximised.

To that end it is important that architects and engineers, when the specifications are being finalised for a building, ensure that Australian products are given ample opportunity to contribute towards the property owner’s ultimate satisfaction. Building materials like concrete and aluminium reinforcements are obvious. But, more importantly, there are also the categories of hardware and tools; electrical, electronic and mechanical; plumbing, air conditioning and security; paint, window and door finishings and white goods.

The supplier industries to the building sector in Australia are without question world leaders in their areas of activity, both in terms of innovative products and whole of life

value for money. The Australian Made Australian Grown (AMAG) logo is the certification mark used by many of these companies to clearly establish that their products are indeed made in Australia.

The Australian Made, Australian Grown Campaign welcomes the opportunity to work with the professional sectors to help identify suppliers of Australian products. Not only is this good for the Australian suppliers and the broader economy – jobs, investment, training opportunities, taxes, etc – it is also good for the building owners because the end result is a product of even higher quality.

Ian Harrison Chief Executive Australian Made, Australian Grown Campaign

USING CERTIFIED WOOD COULD BE MUSIC TO YOUR EARS Building with Certified timber ensures that you are using an environmentally and sustainably managed product.

Quantum G14137 Photo by Peter Hyatt

The fact that you can also achieve award winning outcomes makes its use a sound decision.

8MMB GQ EMMB EMMB UMMB GQ @CRRCP AUSTRALIAN FOREST CERTIFICATION SCHEME (AFCS)

4CRRGLE RFC QR?LB?PB for sustainable forest management in Australia

www.forestrystandard.org.au Phone: +61 (0) 2 6122 9000 Email: info@forestrystandard.org.au

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AFS/01-10-01

Australian made

Industry Figures Back Australian Made Push

By Helen Jacobs

Calls by leading industry figures for greater support of Australian made building products are being echoed by statistics which show that the local manufacturing sector continues to play a significant role in growing the national economy.

As part of the Federal Government’s $19.1 million Australian Industry Participation Package, companies bidding for government contracts over $20 million must provide details of how they will give local small and medium enterprises the opportunity to supply goods and services.

Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, Kim Carr, says this process is designed to ensure that opportunities are both known and accessible to potential domestic participants in all major projects.

“The use of Australian products and materials in building projects benefits both the builder and the Australian economy” Carr says.

“There are significant advantages when building projects can draw on the expertise of local suppliers, and builders can be assured that local products meet high quality standards and are suitable for Australian conditions” he says, “It is about giving local industry the best chance of getting in the game, and the best chance of winning”.

According to a report by the Industry Capability Network, in the six years to June 2007, the manufacturing industry contributed, on average, 10.3% to Australia’s GDP and 10.6% of the nation’s total employment.

The report, Economic Impacts of the Manufacturing and Services Sectors 2008 showed that for each year between 2001-02 to 2006-07, turn-over grew by 7%; industry value added increased by 5.5 %; total employment grew 1.2% and total wages increased by 7.4%.

The report also states that for every $1 million worth of new or retained manufacturing business in Australia more than $330,000 worth of tax revenue is generated; industry value is increased by $985,000; almost $100,000 in welfare benefits is saved and 10 full time jobs are created.

The Australian Made, Australian Grown (AMAG) Campaign’s Chief Executive Ian Harrison agrees the benefits of utilising Australian made building projects stretch far beyond the construction site.

“These figures from the ICN confirm that every dollar invested in manufacturing in Australia has a follow-on benefit to the country in terms of factories and offices built, jobs created, goods and services purchased, taxes paid and welfare payments reduced,” Harrison says.

“Australia has some of the most innovative businesses which produce exceptional products in terms of their functionality and value. They are manufactured by Australians, for Australian conditions and to Australia’s high standards” he adds.

The AMAG logo is used as a certification trademark by many of Australia’s leading suppliers to the building sector.

BlueScope Steel’s National Marketing Manager for Building

Markets, Brian Kelly, says Australia is well regarded as a country that produces quality products.

“We pride ourselves on delivering quality products for the building and construction industry” Kelly says, “For instance, with Colorbond Steel, we have spent over 40 years developing world leading paint and coating technologies, designed specifically for the harsh Australian environment”.

“The Australian Made logo is universally recognisable as the symbol of Australian made products” he adds, “Therefore, it is important to us as it allows our stakeholders to categorically know they are dealing with an Australian company producing Australian made steel products that are made specifically for Australian conditions”. |7

AWARDWORTHY: CMI Toyota West Terrace Showroom

Driven to Succeed: CMI Toyota West Terrace Showroom

It isn’t often that a company gets the chance to completely revitalise the way they do business, but it’s an opportunity Commercial Motor Industries (CMI), a division of the CMV Group, have embraced with open arms with the completion of their new $24 million, four-storey, showroom, office and service centre on West Terrace in Adelaide.

“Our business was previously operating out of very dated premises,” explains CMV’s Business Development Manager, Stephen Parker. “The facilities were neither customer nor employee friendly. In fact, they were pretty much the opposite”.

The first priority for the new showroom was that it should display every new vehicle in the Toyota range. “We also wanted to integrate the new vehicle sales area and the service reception,” adds Parker. “Customers who now bring their vehicle into the dealership for a service are able to talk to the sales person who sold them the vehicle and also browse at the new vehicles that are on display.” a large customer lounge area now provides the main focus for the dealership. CMI also needed to update its workshop facilities, and as Parker explains, “We now have one of the best workshops in Australia with the technicians now at the front of house.

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The technicians working on the vehicles are on full display to all customers”.

Covering over 5,000m2 the new showroom houses up to 265 administrative, sales, service and parts staff, can house up to 400 cars, and took 18 months to build. Designed by Matthews Architects in Adelaide, and constructed by Built Environs, the driving factors behind the design were to “create a facility to consolidate the activities and operations of CMI Toyota’s new car sales and service departments in one location.

And in doing so, create a new flagship dealership with a state of the art service centre, a spare parts department, a new vehicle showroom, vehicle cleaning and storage facilities and an administration department,” explains project architect Gerald Matthews. “The vision for the project was to create a customer-focused, completely integrated sales and service centre in a building designed to promote

Photos courtesy of Sarah Long

The showroom’s design places the service department on prominent display on Adelaide's heavily trafficked West Terrace. The design of the completely covered driveway and the use of translucent roofing creates a space for the drop-off and pick-up of vehicles that feels very light and open. The transparency of the building allows customers in the driveway to see straight through the building to West Terrace.

openness and collaboration between departments as well as openness between CMI’s staff and customers”.

The site was originally comprised of several separate land titles and included a street. For the realisation of the project these were acquired and consolidated into a single title. The site now consists of a single building comprising vehicle servicing, new car sales, a customer lounge, administration facilities, vehicle storage, showroom display areas, sales offices, spare parts and merchandising, pick-up and drop-off, customer parking, two automated car washes, a training centre, catering kitchen, staff lounges and conference rooms.

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Big on Transparency The spectacular, full-height structural glazing installed on the West Terrace frontage of the showroom is one of the building’s most impressive features.

Measuring 7m high, 2m wide and 25mm thick, the panes of glass had to be specially made and imported from China and they are architecturally stunning.

The glass panels are restrained by billets suspended from the second floor to present a solid glass appearance. This is thought to be the first application of this

sized glass in Adelaide, and posed both logistic and construction challenges for the project team.

The original brief for this main glass façade was fully documented from both the architectural practice and engineering perspectives, the objective being to

provide a dramatic yet uncomplicated presentation of the client’s products to the public. The 7m high panes weren’t part of the original design; unable to be made in Australia, the initial design instead specified a horizontal glass joint to allow each section of the façade to be comprised of two panes.

Heritage Glass was brought on board to supply and install the glass façade, and after reviewing the design brief, revisited the basic façade design with the architect and builder to offer an alternative which would be as uncomplicated as possible, and allowed CMI to display their cars as clearly as possible.

“Our initial reaction to the proposed design was that the horizontal glass joint should be removed, and that the split glass panels should be substituted with full height glass panels,” explains Heritage Glass’s Bob Taylor. “This would not only enhance the presentation of the façade and overcome the complications the original concept had of top hanging glass panels, but it also offered a cost and time benefit to the project; as the change to full height panels allowed for the panels to be dead loaded on the floor, and simplified the design from an engineering point of view”.

Heritage Glass worked through this process with the project engineers and arrived at a redesigned proposal which was then presented to the architect, the builder and their client. CMI really liked the redesigned concept and Heritage Glass was given approval to proceed with the redesigned façade.

The main showroom is separated from the service centre by a glass wall allowing customers to clearly see the care taken with vehicles. |9

AWARDWORTHY: CMI Toyota West Terrace Showroom

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Cleaning Up The building’s other standout feature would have to be the two fully automatic car washers on the second level. For Washcraft, who supplied the washers, this was the first project in their experience to ever attempt locating car washers above ground level. In order to realize the washers, Aurecon and Built Environs spent a great deal of time and effort waterproofing the car washers from the rest of the building.

The building harvests rainwater from the roof for collection in six 136,000 litre underground concrete tanks beneath the driveway, which were poured in situ and backfilled. Water for the carwash is drawn from the tanks and is then collected and reused for further washes.

“The car washes provided some serious challenges,” says Ellis, “the carwash is located on the mezzanine floor, above the main offices, so we spent a lot of time considering the waterproofing and drainage system to use. We looked at a couple of different options, we decided on the steel frame, and then looked at a post-tension watertight deck, but that was too expensive, so we then looked at providing a main structural slab that had reasonably heavy reinforcement, and looked at using a Xypex additive in the concrete to provide watertight characteristics”.

“That became our base slab,” Ellis continues, “similar to a shower we

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“We were really impressed with the input and acceptance of the redesigned concept by everyone concerned,” says Taylor, “and then by everyone’s willingness to work as a team to overcome the challenges the revised concept presented”.

Two of the biggest challenges the redesign presented, were the design of the articulated stainless steel retaining brackets required to support the glass, and the sourcing of the oversize glass panels from overseas. The logistical challenges were a daunting prospect for the team but the end more than justified the means.

“The glazed façade is restrained by a reinforcing system of top hung columns and billets to eliminate the need for lower level fins or bracing,” explains Matthews.

“We worked closely with Aurecon and Heritage Glass to design a hanging support structure in keeping with the design language of the building”.

At 7m high, the glass panels weighed in at a whopping 800kg each, making them the largest glass panels used in South Australia to date. “In dealing with the installation, we had to be especially mindful of OH&S issues to ensure the complete safety of our installation crew.” explains Taylor, “With the glass being an imported product, special care and attention to the installation details was absolutely paramount to avoid any breakages”.

The glass was delivered to the site on pre-cast concrete trucks and installed

created a basin, with 300mm dwarf walls around it and ramps to allow the cars up. Within the car wash itself there is trench grate that collects the water and takes it back to the reusable water tanks. We saw multiple layers as quite critical to making it work, as obviously the damage would be huge if leakage occurred, so once each layer was complete, we would water test it over the weekend to check that everything worked”. The floor of the carwash is comprised of a double slab with an intermediate membrane and stainless steel surface drainage. The water used is collected, conditioned and reused.

Clear Communication Transparency was a major design point with the West Terrace showroom.

“Placing the service centre on display at the front of the building gave it equal weighting to the showroom,” Matthews explains. “They are separated internally by a glass wall which allows customers in the showroom to witness the care being taken by CMI in the maintenance of the cars. The facility is designed so that any customer, whether they are coming in to buy a key-ring, spark-plug or a new car, all enter through the same entry”.

Glazing and transparency between the different departments now affords them the opportunity to provide seamless service as one unified business.

Coupled with the visual transparency is an advanced public address system that allows people to page individual areas, and a superb Bose stereo system throughout the building that uses a large number of speakers to keep volume levels lower. The stereo system provides masking noise throughout the showroom and service centre to improve the comfort of the building’s acoustics.

“The brief was that everything must be symmetrical and slim-lined.” explains SA Electronics’ CEO Adrian Bianchet, “Acoustically, the most troublesome area was the service bay, which being a large area, is particularly noisy with cars and the HVAC system; which features a massive extraction system; to accommodate this, we used special 360 degree speakers to flood the whole area with masking noise, which provides really good coverage, and makes the acoustics much more manageable”.

“The building is now a fantastic facility for the business,” Stephen Parker concludes. “It is an absolute pleasure for all employees to work within, and staff morale is at an all time high. Customers are continually complimenting us on the facility. CMI Toyota has always had a customer first culture. The new building on West Terrace is enabling us to enhance this reputation”.

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The design takes on new dimension at night with the building glowing from within. The display of new cars in the upper level galleries as well as the ground level showroom takes full advantage of the building's location.

using a Franna crane and a special glass suction device that Heritage Glass had used on similar installations in the past.

Adding to the complication was the fact that the glass had to be installed from inside the building envelope in order to avoid contact with the power lines, which ran across the entire length of the façade. The end result is a stunning façade which puts the display of the cars front-and-centre.

The height of the glazed façade, or more specifically the height of the void behind it, provided perhaps the biggest challenge for the project’s structural engineers, Aurecon. “Structurally the bulk of the building has a two story void,” explains Aurecon’s Mark Ellis. “With both the workshop area and 50% of the showroom there's no first floor to speak of; this meant we were going up 7.5m from the ground floor to the floor above, which required a significant structural solution.

We ended up opting for a prop-free design, which made it pretty economical, with spans of up to 12m, a composite slab with a permanent steel formwork system, both the secondary and primary beams were composite as well to minimise the weight of the beams and the need for any additional propping”.

Landscaping

Active Landscaping

By Mark Kenfield

The Grove library, currently under construction in Western Perth, will incorporate a host of active landscaping features, including a rainwater harvesting system connected to 258,000 litre storage tanks, and treatment facilities for treating and reusing wastewater and stormwater onsite.

In spite of the connotations the word evokes, ‘landscaping’ is not, by nature, a particularly natural thing. “It is a tenuous affair when one considers landscaping to be providing a ‘natural environment’.” says President of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects WA Group, Matt Huxtable.

Landscaping may mimic nature, but being a built thing, it won’t necessarily function as nature would. It’s here that ‘active landscaping’ comes into play.

Active landscaping is essentially exactly what the name implies, it’s about activating a building’s landscaping to positively contribute to that building beyond mere beautification. With climate change seeing many regions across Australia moving to greater extremes of climate and weather over the past 10-15 years, with drought increasing in some areas and the volume and intensity of floods in others, this has brought a new urgency to questions of how we manage landscaping over a broad range of environments to make them both sustainable and self-sustaining.

A Watery Issue As such, there is a distinct need for us to consider the landscaping we implement in a more comprehensive manner, and to reconsider those that currently underperform. Perhaps the biggest recent development in this regard, is the use of landscaping for the capture and harvesting of rainwater.

“This is called Water Sensitive Design (WSD),” says Context Landscaping’s Oi Choong, and is ideally suited to landscapes as the options for placing water tanks underground or using planter box-styled tanks.

Intrinsically linked with WSD, is Water Sensitive Urban Drainage Design (WSUD). “Sustainable drainage is an element of the ‘Hydrological Cycle’. It 12 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

involves the collection of rainwater, its treatment and, ultimately, its reuse.” explains ACO Polycrete’s John Sordo, “The process involves capturing water run-off, which may or may not contain pollutants, so that it can be dealt with in a controlled manner.” In this way the water can then be treated, stored for future use, or transported to receiving waterways. This transfer of water comes at a relatively low cost, and causes minimal damage and danger to the environment.

“Surface drainage can be implemented wherever rainwater runs off the landscaping and on to paved areas.” Sordo continues, “Grated trench drains are ideal for the capture and collection of this run-off, as they form a barrier to prevent rainwater run-off flowing onto the soft landscaping, where collection is more difficult. This is of particular importance if the risk of contamination is high”.

Reading More Into Landscaping One current project that has seen active landscaping play an intrinsic part in its design is ‘The Grove’, a new library currently under construction to service the communities of Cottesloe, Peppermint Grove and Mosman Park in Western Perth. “The project is a showcase of ESD technologies both in the building and its integration into the landscape.” explains Matt Huxtable.

“The library includes a number of key active landscaping elements, including: rainwater storage that has been built into a children’s playground; stormwater collection and a demonstration on water filtration through sedge treatment cells”.

The project is an Australian first for a building of its type, thanks to cutting edge waste water re-usage. “The system will separate the black-water stream into brown-water and yellowwater streams.” explains Huxtable,

“The brown water will be used to irrigate the turf areas of the landscaping through a biological aerobic wastewater treatment system and subsurface irrigation. The quantity of turf in the project is directly correlated to the expected output from the northern building and its occupancy. The separated yellow water is held in purposedesigned tanks and after the settling process will be used as nutrient injection into the various irrigated garden beds, also using subsurface irrigation.”

The system’s grey water stream (which is separate to the black-water system) will be used to irrigate other garden areas whose plans will tolerate the nutrient/chemical loads.

The landscape design also incorporates a number of other elements such as extensive use of endemic West Australian flora, the use of recycled and local materials. Huxtable notes that the design aesthetic purposefully strays from the traditional ‘environmental approach’ and attempts to facilitate all of the above-mentioned elements to create a unique and interesting landscape in a civic setting.

Spreading the Seeds All urban landscapes have the capacity to enhance and regenerate the natural benefits and services provided by ecosystems in their natural state. And everything from multi-residential, retail and commercial buildings, through to industrial estates, government and educational buildings and even infrastructure and recreational areas can function as part of this broader global life-support system.

The opportunity now exists for landscaping to provide not only cosmetic benefits, but to make genuine in-roads in the sustainability of our built environment. And that’s a seed worth sowing.

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AWARDWORTHY: Costco Docklands

From Ubiquitousness to Uniqueness: Costco Docklands

As the ninth largest retailer in the world, and with over 560 stores across the globe, wholesale retailer Costco knows a thing or two about building big retail stores. Unlike regular stores here in Australia, Costco uses a club-membership process, where you pay $60 a year for access to their wholesale prices. It’s a system that’s worked very well for the retailer, allowing them to expand across Northern and Central America, the United Kingdom, Asia and now finally to Australia, to Melbourne’s Docklands to be precise.

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fact, but that means they have to work very hard to keep their costs down. Which meant that the building couldn’t receive any special interior design work, and had to use concrete flooring throughout. In essence it was just supposed to be a big, high-bayed, 15,000m2 shed”.

Growing Pains The theory was simple enough, reality however – as it so often does – insisted on posing the project some complications. “We wanted to built a

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Now on one level the sheer volume of stores that Costco has built in the past kept the initial brief for the $20 million Docklands store fairly straightforward.

Like other big international wholesale traders Costco has a universal store plan that applies to all of their buildings.

Creating a generic building product suits a company like Costco because it matches their ethos; as NH Architecture’s Principal on the project, Hamish Lyon explains, “They are a wholesaler, they trade on small margins and they are proud of that

Main: The northern length of the store as seen looking south from Footscray Road. In order to accomplish the diagonal colour changes, the wall sheeting had to be installed twice on many areas of the façade. This required additional man hours that had to be worked into the project schedule provided by the general contractor.

Photo courtesy of Peter Hyatt

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Third Time’s The Charm Through the recommendation of Vicurban, Costco then met with NH Architecture. “We came in to negotiate a way through,” explains Lyon, “and we said to Costco ‘We won’t change your store plan, but we need to make the building significantly respond to the mandate for contemporary architecture.’They said ‘That’s okay, we’ll do that.’ So off we went”.

NH’s response was to modify the articulation of the façade into a big abstract geometry that responded to the considerable scale of the site, and to design a colour-defined pattern into the cladding to provide further visual interest.

“Vicurban was conscious of the projection that the Southern Star Observation Wheel was expected to see over a million visitors a year,” says Lyon, “with the majority being foreign tourists, for whom the view from the wheel would provide part of their first impression of Melbourne”.

With this in mind, Vicurban was very determined that those visitors shouldn’t be looking down on 15,000m2 of plain tin shed roofing. “We had to design the whole roof with a pattern continuing over it”, continues Lyon. “The whole building has become a large, monumental bit of abstract sculpture. Because most of the time you’re looking at it whilst driving past on Footscray Road, we determined that the side facing the road had to be big and symbolic”.

The other big change that NH made architecturally was to reverse the floorplan, and although this led to several southern-hemisphere jokes, it also led to the creation of a big public forecourt that brought customers from the carpark to the front of the store. This created a major public place that helps connect the store into the Docklands precinct as a whole, and creates a space to put public art, store trolleys, have sausage sizzles etc.

With the forecourt providing a lead-in to the building, NH then designed a big

typical Costco model,” explains Costco Australia CEO Patrick Noone, “as close to freeways and the CBD as possible”.

Costco tries to site most of their stores on the edge of cities, near big freeways and interchanges, in order to provide them with the best road access possible.

When Costco decided on Melbourne for their first Australian store, they found a suitable site in Docklands next to the (then assembled) Southern Star Observation Wheel. Located on the cityend of Footscray Road, the site was close to the city and just down the road from the Bolte Bridge. They calculated the road travel statistics and found that the site was ideal for their purposes, albeit “on a smaller piece of land than we're used to building on,” Noone concedes.

With the site decided on, Costco’s next step was to put their standard shed in place, however they then found they couldn’t get through the permit process.

Vicurban, the Victorian Government Authority who manage the Docklands has a very consistent and long-running

cantilever roof over the entranceway, providing an architectural feature to give it presence, but also to provide weather protection for people by the front door. “All of these were pretty radical ideas for Costco”, explains Lyon, but the store’s popularity seemed to bear out their inclusion.

Camouflage and Concealment Meeting Vicurban’s requirements didn’t stop at providing just for those viewing it from on high or zipping past along Footscray Road. The Docklands’ authority are very particular about maintaining the public spaces in the area, so the project’s landscaping component received considerable attention from landscape consultants, Rush Wright Associates.

The sheer scale of the landscaping was perhaps the most impressive aspect of the project according to Rush Wright Landscape Architect, Loredana Ducco. “The site called for a budgetsavvy resolution for a big site with a big building”, she says, adding that, “Our solution was a striking and simple design, with a refined material pallet allows for clarity and legibility of the overall concept”.

The key elements of the landscape design included the ‘Welcome Mat’, the extension of an Urban Forest onto the site and extensive storm water treatment swales. The Welcome Mat provides a grand ramped access up to the retail entry from the street. It is 80x30m in dimension and its orientation provides direct physical and visual links back to the Observation Wheel within the Star City development. The use of black and white coloured concrete has resulted in a bold, striated ground plane.

An urban forest extends from the northern end of the site at Footscray Road and finishes at the base of the Mat. Once the trees have matured it will provide a green treed entry into the precinct and extend the existing densely vegetated bank along Moonee Ponds Creek. The forest wraps around and over the external car park to provide screening.

Water Sensitive Urban Design also plays a considerable factor in the landscaping. “We’ve put rock-mulched planted infiltration swales suitable for the onsite treatment of storm water all around the site”, explains Ducco. “We’ve designed the landscape with the future in mind; using native plants that, once established, will require minimal maintenance and ongoing watering”.

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mandate that Docklands needs to be a place of quality contemporary architecture, and Costco’s standard shed design didn’t meet those requirements.

“We didn’t want to reinvent the wheel”, explains Noone. “We just wanted to use designs and systems which have been proven at Costco sites around the world over many years”. So Costco revised the design and made a second application, but that was rejected as well, forcing them to find another way to make the building’s design respond to the greater network of the Docklands.

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Photo courtesy of Trevor Mein

Photo courtesy of Peter Hyatt

AWARDWORTHY: Costco Docklands BlueScope Buildings provided the supply and co-ordination of steel materials and services to Span who then handled the installation. BlueScope brought in truss purlins that could span over twice the distance of conventional purlins, allowing the rafters to be used at 17m centres. These members minimised the need for internal columns, which helped to keep the interior of the shed remarkably open, especially given the span of the roof.

BlueScope co-ordinated the supply of about 590 tons of primary, secondary and miscellaneous steel, 103 tons of roof panels and 28 tons of wall sheeting. As the design called for diagonal colour changes across the façade, “we essentially had to install the wall sheeting twice on many areas”, explains Span Project Manager, Scott Clausen. “This required additional man hours that had to be worked into the project schedule provided by Hansen Yuncken. But by working closely with them and the other sub-contractors, everyone was able to complete their scope in the sequence required”.

The installation of the roofing was one of the most impressive aspects of the construction, with the rollout of almost 15,000m2 of special, watertight MR600 roofing product completed in less than three weeks; which is a remarkable turnaround time for such a high volume of roofing.

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Conclusion Capping off the Docklands store is its interior, which follows in the footsteps of many a Costco before it; all of the interior structure, the trusses and purlins are painted white, which combines with a quite sophisticated double-thermal skylight system to provide a comfortable daylight glow that gives the store a very open feel, the quality of the flooring is impeccable as well, which as Hamish Lyon explains, “uses this special Costco secret recipe for concrete flooring, which creates this incredibly smooth floor; trolleys just glide over it.” This helps provide the store with a feeling of quality that truly belies its budget construction.

Costco build at incredibly cheap rates, and they don’t hide that fact. They’re proud of it and it helps them promote their brand. “We save you money, so you can buy cheaper products” is the philosophy in a nutshell.” So the entire building was built to incredibly standard commercial rates. “All of the materials were standard warehouse materials,” concludes Lyon, “so we had to create these big, monumental shapes and forms using traditional construction techniques, steel profiles, and cladding materials that were all standard”. All in all, an extraordinary outcome from very standard stuff.

Top: The building's forecourt at dusk. It provides both a public space and pedestrian link to the greater Docklands area. Connecting with the area's pedestrian network, it will eventually (once it is reconstructed) continue past The Wheel and into the Docklands proper.

Bottom: The building's interior is a single massive space. The steel trusses across the roof are designed to an extremely high level, providing structural support across a very high span and a huge space. The interior flooring is polished concrete, and is finished to an extremely high standard, which helps to provide a sense of quality to customers as it allows trolleys travel across the floor very smoothly.

Due to size constraints and the sensitive landscaping components around the site, the project’s landscaping philosophy was considerably different to the usual ‘box and a carpark’ syndrome that accompanies most large wholesale retail stores. “The landscaping was specifically built up so that it would camouflage the on-road carparking and loading dock,” explains Lyon, “that way you don’t get the sense of the building sitting in a flat bit of asphalt, which given the amount of space they had to work with was very impressive”.

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Construction Builders Hansen Yuncken were brought in as the lead contractor on the project with Californian-based steel construction specialists Span Construction as the leading subcontractor. “Span Buildings is our

16 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

preferred construction contractor for our outlets in the United States and elsewhere, so we went with them for the Docklands store”, explains Noone.

On top of the main shed, construction included a receiving dock, the entry concourse and a 500-space carpark underneath it all. Construction was completed under a fast-tracked schedule of works taking just 9 months.

“One of our biggest challenges was the management of both local and US-based consultant teams on the project”, explains Hansen Yuncken’s Project Manager Geoff Miller, “which involved the intensive tailoring of the design to Australian customs and practice as works continued. Having to procure materials from overseas and long leadtimes on plant and equipment items all added to the logistical challenge”.

Retrofitting

Art installations can transform tired lobbies into captivating spaces

The Case for Retrofits and Restorations

By Natalie Carter

With a truly global push towards greater sustainability currently underway, the Market for non-residential green building retrofits is set to soar, representing a great opportunity for designers, builders and developers. According to several industry reports, retrofits of this nature covering, for example, the installation of energy-saving lighting, mechanical and electrical systems, will grow to between $10.1 and $15.1 billion by 2014. This means that in the US alone, green buildings will comprise a 20-30% share of the US retrofit and renovation market in five years.

Not surprisingly, “the greatest opportunity for green design and construction activity lies not in constructing new green buildings, but in engaging in the retrofit and renovation of existing ones”.

In Australia, the trend is similar. Smart industry participants recognise that the commercial building market represents one of the largest opportunities for energy savings, reductions in carbon emissions and increased property values. They recognise too, that most major projects will not be driven by cost savings, but rather by the need to meet broader policy and business objectives, such as lower carbon footprints, higher employee productivity and higher property values.

Indeed, Gray Puksand architect, Nik Tabain believes there are immediate benefits to retrofitting and restoring existing buildings. “Building owners are potentially protecting or increasing the asset value of their buildings while reducing the energy use of the space,” Tabain says.

“In a tenant driven market, retrofits and renovations have the ability to reposition the commercial space to the market and appeal to a different tenant type”.

So what is involved in retrofitting and restoring commercial spaces? With the drive towards environmentally sustainable design, retrofits and restorations provide the opportunity to install energyefficient lighting and to make more use of natural

daylight. Designers are specifying more energyefficient mechanical and electrical systems, using smart ventilation systems or providing individual thermal comfort controls. Water-efficient plumbing, such as low-flush toilets are installed and more environmentally friendly finishes and furnishings are specified whenever possible. Retrofitting and restoration may also include installing high-performance windows, insulation and other building materials.

However renovations don’t necessarily need to be on a massive scale to achieve the desired outcomes. Tabain suggests that the clever use of lighting, together with the right selection of fittings and programmes, has the ability to give spaces a new life.

“From a pure sustainability point of view,” Tabain adds, “an existing building is already built; we don’t add to the embodied energy and water used for construction”.

Roger Kluske, associate at Umow Lai agrees, “The range of available existing buildings is often very good,” he says, “and established locations merely add to the attraction, so from a big picture perspective, the potential environmental benefits are great”.

So if you’re considering the options for a more efficient and effective building, look into sustainable retrofitting.

You just might find the answer lies in simply repurposing what you already have. | 17

Retrofitting

Keeping up with the Times: Working with Heritage Buildings

Photos courtesy of Domenic Ridolfi

By Mark Kenfield

Lately, our industry has started to see something of a change in the way many projects are being approached. What’s old is new again, it would seem, as old buildings find themselves repurposed, refurbished, retrofitted and restored to either former or newfound glory.

The most interesting of these building types being redone are undoubtedly the heritage-listed ones. Which present a whole raft of challenges, from stringent controls on the restoration of ailing sections of the building, through to extreme repurposing and state-of-theart technology upgrades.

“I think the most interesting thing about working on heritage buildings is the fact that they’ve been around for so long,” explains Hyder Consulting’s Principal Diagnostic & Remedial Façade Engineer, Peter Johnsson, “they’ve stood the test of time and fashion, unlike many buildings from the 70s and 80s, that now seem quite dated and unfashionable”.

“With heritage listed buildings you have something that has standing within its city,” Johnsson continues, “and provides a character to that city that many buildings built in the 70s and 80s can't match, while at the same time retaining the heritage character that potential owners and tenants can incorporate as part of their image”.

18 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

Restoring Heritage So what goes into restoring these buildings to their former glory? Well it generally starts when the owners become aware that their building needs a bit of TLC, Johnsson says, such as deterioration of stone façades, corrosion of steel or simply a water leak; this might lead to a condition inspection report of the façade which may identify various options for maintenance, repairs, restoration, reconstruction, preservation or adaptation. All of these are defined under the Australia ICOMOS Burra Charter, 1999 as "Conservation" processes.

“With heritage buildings, you may also have a conservation management plan, written by a heritage architect, which sets down guidelines on what is actually heritage fabric and what should be kept/reinstated” Johnsson explains.

“They’re not necessarily requirements, but guidelines.” Nevertheless, they do place a lot more constraints on what work can be done.

Where with newer buildings, money is the main consideration, and you can tear out windows, repaint, change the colour or over clad the façade; the opposite is the case with a heritage building. “You have to keep it as intact as possible, not replace anything unnecessary, and disturb as little as possible” Johnsson says. You can't be very intrusive and have to be particularly careful that what you do doesn't impact the building in the long term.

Perhaps the most interesting new development in heritage restorations at the moment is the shift towards using traditional methods for repairs, the idea being to use the same methods and materials that have lasted the building well for the maybe 100 years it’s been around so far. “The thinking is that by reinstating those materials, we can hopefully reinstate the building itself for another 100 years.” Johnsson explains.

So new technology is taking a bit of a back seat, but experience has taught heritage restorers that certain modern materials can actually have highly

Retrofitting

adverse affects on traditional materials in the long term. Back in the 1980s there were a number of heritage-listed sandstone buildings that underwent some extensive restoration work, which inadvertently, actually made them worse. The buildings were “repaired” with epoxy and acrylic coatings, which tend to improve waterproofing characteristics. The thought was that if water could be stopped from getting into the sandstone, the problems would be solved; unfortunately what happened instead was that the coatings trapped moisture inside the sandstone, causing salt crystallisation and deterioration to affect them even further.

Since those unfortunate mistakes it has become a priority for heritage specialists to understand the different materials available for repair work, and how they function both from a chemistry and a structural point of view. “If you don't understand the product you're using and what you're putting it on to you might make the problem worse.” Johnsson says. So understanding how the materials respond to each other is vital.

Upgrading Heritage Maintaining the integrity and cultural value of heritage buildings is, of course, one of the primary purposes of having heritage listings. However maintaining enough modern functionality to keep the buildings useable is also an important issue, which brings us to the matter of upgrading heritage buildings. As with any changes to heritage-listed sites, upgrades need to fit within the guidelines of the building’s conservation management plan.

One of the most effective ways to improve the performance of these buildings is through building management systems (BMS). Although, of course, with any heritage project, the ability to implement BMS is going to be dependent upon the feasibility of performing the necessary upgrades to the building’s direct digital control and HVAC systems.

The City of Perth is currently trialling new CSIRO-developed smart energy management software in the historic Council House building in order to try and significantly reduce the building’s energy usage. The software, called the BuildingIQ Energy Optimisation System, targets energy savings, cuts greenhouse gas emissions and aims to improve tenant comfort. “The system does this by looking at a range of factors such as weather forecasts, energy prices and the existing building thermal characteristics (how the building heats up and cools

down under various conditions) to optimise how energy is used” explains BuildingIQ CEO Michael Zimmerman.

“The real smarts of the system are in learning how the building is running on a day-by-day basis; determining the opportunities to shave energy use with tactics such as optimised starts and stops of the HVAC system, which are based on weather forecasts and pre-cooling the building to avoid using too much peak tariff energy; and understanding how to maintain an acceptable level of tenant comfort while doing this”.

This offers the potential for Council House, which was opened by the Queen back in 1963, to reduce its operating expenses and improve the heritage listed building’s official National Australian Built Environment Rating System (“NABERS”) star rating. Impressive stuff for a building that’s almost half a century old.

Another factor that can play a significant part in the performance of heritage buildings is their glazing. Conservation management plans tend to specify that you must retain the appearance of the original glass; which becomes problematic as the effective component in most modern glasses is the interlayer, which tends to be tinted – making the glass unacceptable for most heritage buildings. Fortunately there are some products on the market that provide reduced heat load transfer without the unwanted tint

services whatsoever, so we had to bring everything in. It would have been less expensive to create an entirely new building, but it's heritage listed and we liked the inherent qualities that brought to the building, so we worked around it.” The store required quite a number of facilities to meet its needs, so the big challenge Ridolfi faced was fitting everything the store needed into the outer shell.

The solution to this was to convert the building into 3-stories, and add a glazed utility wing on the first floor.

The wing includes a powder room, kitchen and office, and because it is set behind the building's original parapet, is practically invisible from the street, as is the second floor, which provides the store’s workrooms.

The interior has seen an even more extreme makeover; with mirrored walls, a mirrored staircase and a graffiti-inspired décor thrown in contrast to exposed steelwork of the original building.

The result is spectacular example of how old can become new again, and be all the more special for it. And in the end that’s the great beauty of working with heritage buildings, they really are something special.

Repurposing Heritage Now restoring, repairing and improving heritage buildings is one thing, but repurposing them is something else entirely; the idea generally being to take the heritage-listed shell of a building and completely renovate and retrofit the interior.

A spectacular example of this is the recently completed premises for highfashion boutique Le Louvre just off Chapel St. in Melbourne, an adaptive reuse of an old 1927 tramways substation, which had been decommissioned for years.

Le Louvre is something of a Melbourne Institution having been operating on Collins Street since the 1930s. However as the original building – excepting its heritage-listed façade – will soon be swallowed up by a new high-rise tower, the boutique was forced to find itself a new home. When the tramways substation was settled on, Ridolfi Architecture were brought in to repurpose the building, the original shell of which needed to be restored to its original quality.

Repurposing the building wasn’t easy though, ''It was just one large void” explains project architect Domenic Ridolfi. “There were no floors, and no | 19

Landscaping

Built-In: the Future of Australian Landscaping 90% of Australia’s population live in our biggest cities, which has led to the urban built environment becoming the most influential landscape in our day-today lives. As such, the design, planning and subsequent management of that environment requires an understanding of the functionality and performance that the built landscape can provide.

This involves far more than just simply arranging and maintaining the “green stuff” around our buildings, the trees and vegetation; it involves the impacts of sustained human activity on the water, soils and vegetation in these landscapes, as well as the careful management of the materials utilised in their construction. Energy usage, acoustic performance and water harvesting and capture are now key components of wellconsidered landscaping.

“The design of landscapes is a constantly evolving thing,” explains Geoff Heppner from the Australian Landscaping Industries Association (ALIA), “and not necessarily through a single source. There have been many factors influencing landscape design in recent years; drought has been the most obvious one but there are many others, including: a resurgence in ecologically based design in recent years; better selection and availability of plants that can survive under difficult conditions; and the use of specific plant matters in their natural environments is yet another. In the meantime the supply of landscaping materials is constantly evolving, enabling the design of landscapes to change”.

20 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

One particular trend the Australian landscaping industry has seen considerably growth of in recent years is the way landscape architects work with the existing environment to help buildings harmonise more naturally with their surrounds. “There certainly has been an increasing interest in the seamless integration of landscape and building over the last ten years or so,” says Context Landscaping Director, Oi Choong, “there is a genuine effort to create environments where buildings are not only nestled into their surrounds through landscaping but where you get a genuine hybrid, through the integration of green roofs and living green walls”.

“I think generally, architects and landscape architects in recent times have been working together from the outset in planning and integrating buildings and the landscape.” Adds President of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects (AILA) WA Group, Matt Huxtable. “This is particularly successful where you have a strong interface between the interior of a building and its external environment and the considerations for the value of the landscape opportunities is explored right from the master planning stage”.

This increased integration of landscaping into the base designs can work wonders for helping buildings sit more naturally on their sites, though Huxtable cautions that it is a tenuous affair to start considering a building’s landscape to provide a ‘natural environment’. “We have a tendency to assume that designed landscapes

By Mark Kenfield

assume an original ‘natural’ order,” he says, “but rather, landscaping either mimics nature or represents our cultural reaction to it.” Huxtable believes that the opportunities for landscape architecture around a building go far beyond mere beautification. “Landscaping should respond to a complex array of ecological, cultural and technological opportunities,” he says, “and use them to create a unique designed space”.

“We like to work closely with the architects to identify the best possible outcomes for the project in terms of landscape potential.” He adds, “Every project has a multitude of differing constraints but we always try to achieve a unique outcome to create a building and landscape that attempts to create a sense of place”.

The Cutting Edge One of the most exciting things about the increased integration of landscaping with other areas of design, development and construction is the number of new landscaping opportunities it is opening up. “The potential for environmentally sustainable technologies in the landscape is one of the most exciting developments out there at the moment.”

Says Matt Huxtable, “The challenges of sustainability, although sometimes difficult, present some really exciting opportunities for design professionals to show innovation and advocacy in confronting issues such as climate change and depleting resources. On a local level I am also excited about the potential of using more endemic flora in our planting

Photo courtesy of Christian Borchert of McGregor Coxall

The spectacular view of Sydney Harbour from the lower grass terraces of Ballast Point Park, which has been redeveloped and rehabilitated from a contaminated former industrial lubricant production site, into a wonderful, environmentally friendly public park.

Landscaping

palettes. This is particularly relevant to Western Australia at the moment, as we have largely under-utilised selections of endemic plants.”

For Choong, it is the new project opportunities that are most exciting; “In urban areas in particular, the ability to revive and find new users for derelict and post industrial sites is really interesting at the moment.” She says, “In Sydney in particular we’ve had the acclaimed Ballast Point Park, which is a new waterfront park that has been created out of land that had been used for industrial purposes for years, which had prevented people from using the area and enjoying the harbour”.

Natural Building Blocks One of the key developments pushing the possibilities of landscaping forward at the moment is the rapid growth of products and materials available. Diversity has been one of the largest drivers of this, “In the past, for commercial landscaping you would have 500 of one thing and 600 of another,” explains Harper, “but now there's a lot more variety in products, plants and materials so you see a

great deal more diversity going into landscaping. Things like multileveled planting are becoming a lot more common, and people are starting to consider things like the solar properties of trees, and the usability they provide to buildings”.

The other key driver in products and materials would appear to be the push towards sustainable building practices and Green Star accreditation. “We are far more conscious of using recycled materials now,” adds Choong, “of using plant materials that use less water, and of creating landscapes that respond to the land; so that we’re not putting in plants or materials that are incompatible.

We are using artificial soils, recycled concrete, and doing what we can to avoid unsustainable practices like constantly raiding the bush for bush rocks”.

Between this growth in diversity and the increasing integration of landscaping design from the earliest stages of development; Australia is seeing a marked change in the way our industry handles the landscaping of our built environment - one that is less tacked-on and more built-in.

Windturbines are just one of the initiatives that underpin ESD objectives of Ballast Point Park’s Landscaping.

The Benefits of Certifying Sustainable Timber With more and more public and private timber procurement policies demanding that timber and woodderived products come from legal and sustainable sources; which can only be demonstrated through the Australian Forestry Standard’s Chain-of-Custody (CoC) certification; business interest in CoC certification is soaring.

The Australian Forestry Standards are the only Standards in forestry accredited by Standards Australia.

When the AFCS entered an alliance with the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification schemes (PEFC), the world's largest forest certification organisation, Australian companies achieved the additional credibility and strength of a globally recognised certification scheme that is second to none.

A further endorsement of the AFCS and PEFC came earlier this year with recognition from the Green Building Council’s Green Star rating program, which provides architects and

designers with the benefit of adding points to a project’s Green Star rating when they supply certified timber to the construction.

There are a number of benefits for architects, building designers and developers when recommending AFS and PEFC certified product to their clients.

Firstly there’s access to markets, you can enhance brand value by demanding environmentally responsible products, which in turn gives you a market advantage in relation to companies with uncertified products.

Secondly, there’s availability and choice. Two-thirds of the world's certified forest areas are certified by the PEFC. That is currently more than 220 million certified hectares, offering the widest supply of certified fibre and timber. Of those 220 million hectares, 9.9 million are Australian forests and provide certified sustainable timber to our industry.

Thirdly, it provides a clear and transparent message; the simple

industry matters

action of being able to include the PEFC logo on a product or productline communicates to the customer in a clear, concise and transparent manner that those wood and nontimber products have been sourced from sustainably managed forests Fourthly, there’s traceability. CoC certification offers assurances that the wood in the final product can be traced back to a sustainable source managed with due respect for environmental, economic and social standards.

And finally, there’s risk management.

CoC certification includes a due diligence system to exclude wood from illegal and controversial sources.

Timber is a 100% renewable resource.

AFS and PEFC CoC certification ensures that you are using timber that is harvested in a sustainable manner.

Kayt Watts Chief Executive Officer Australian Forestry Standard Limited & PEFC Australia | 21

Wayfinding

Wayfinding: negotiating complex spaces

By Lieu Thi Pham & Emily Dane

Image courtesy of Buro North

Say “wayfinding” to someone and you'll most likely be met with a puzzled or blank expression. “Is that something to do with signs?” ask the uninitiated.

Wayfinding strategies focus on developing detailed understandings of user profiles and pedestrian behaviours around each building, this helps to make the wayshowing address the operational requirements of each project.

The term “wayfinding” is used to describe the way in which we negotiate spaces and map out routes to arrive at a destination. "Wayfinders work on the most fluent way of directing people from A to B” explains Kevin Dogan, director of signage company Hermes Identity, “It's amazing what a difference strong colours and good signage can make to an environment”. However, to attribute wayfinding just to signage would be an over simplification of this highly complex area of expertise. These days wayfinding involves a myriad of elements including interiors and lighting, sculptures and landmarks, signage and typography and even behavioural psychology.

Despite the increase in the need for good wayfinding signage in both commercial and public spaces, it is still a methodology that is often overlooked in the design and building process.

Although several companies have realised the importance of effective wayfinding, it is often simply regarded as a ‘signage issue’ and not brought into the building project early enough.

With more than 20 years experience in wayfinding and wayshowing, Professor of Communication Design as Swinburne 22 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

University, Per Mollerup, notes that wayshowing is yet to be given the attention it deserves in many building projects. Often this important task is being delegated to the architects involved in the project, and they rarely consider wayfinding as an important component in the initial stages. Wayshowing is the professional term for the designer's work.

“Wayshowing facilitates wayfinding”, adds Per Mollerup.

Generally, when wayshowing is finally considered, it is often due to inefficient existing wayfinding or signage causing confusion amongst visitors.

“Wayshowing including signage is often repair design” adds Mollerup.

Ideally, when building new and complex built environments, which may be expanded in the future, wayshowing consultants should be brought in to help establish a wayfinding strategy that can be used for any additions the building may see in the future.

Show me the way According to Per Mollerup, there are nine tacit strategies for wayfinding that we all use when trying to navigate new environments. Knowing these strategies

helps wayshowing experts create signage that works for most people.

Adopting signage that reflects the corporate brand is tempting; however this should be implemented with caution.

Colour can be seen from longer distances than any other graphic elements, but certain colour guidelines follow. As an example, the green colour we often see on escape signs inside buildings should not be used on any other indoor signage as it might cause initial confusion.

Wayfinding in hospital environments Environments in which good wayshowing and signage are crucial include infrastructure, airports and hospitals. The common denominator is that visitors are often anxious, nervous, busy, or in the case of the latter; might have reduced capacities, which necessitates easy and clear navigation.

An excellent example of this is the Olivia Newton John Cancer Wellness Centre (ONJCWC), which was designed by Jackson Architecture in close collaboration with wayfinding specialists Buro North. The project benefited immensely from Buro North’s

Wayfinding

wayfinding expertise, particularly in dealing with the project’s unique user group. As ONJCWC’s Project Director Megan Gray explains, "The nature of the client group that uses this facility are generally patients that are going through cancer treatment; from diagnosis through to palliative care". With this in mind, the project team created a supportive environment that minimised walking distances, and helps to alleviate patient anxiety and stress. Many people entering healthcare facilities are disempowered by the concept of the health facility, but the simplicity of navigation, the points of arrival, the feeling of comfort afforded by good wayfinding, and human intervention, all play a role in supporting a person to their destination.

The $75 million state-funded project, a part of the Austin Hospital campus, also featured labyrinthine inter-building connections and four levels of on-grade access. A key issue for the centre was that the ground floor was situated on level two which could cause people significant confusion. The design team spent a lot of time playing around with design elements to provide clarity and ultimately, large sculptural numbers to signal a point of entry was provided as a

We design and develop wayfinding graphic navigational strategies.

Over ten years wayfinding consulting for the public and private sector.

solution to level identification. The design brief also called for an environment that was aesthetically warmer and less clinical than regular hospital facilities. As Buro North’s wayfinding strategist Finn Butler explains, “The centre has all the medical requirements and delivery of care requirements that a general health environment does, but needs to feel like a wellness centre, not a clinical facility."

In collaboration with Buro North, Jackson Architecture came up with a design that would use a courtyard to link the building elements visually and spiritually, both vertically and horizontally, to the main facility. As Jackson Architecture’s Alex Stephanou explains, “The centre provides a place of tranquillity, of peace, of reflection and of life, and colour thereby sustaining the essence of one's recovery�.

Meeting both the design vision and operational requirements, the ONJCWC is an excellent example of the benefits of integrating wayfinding with design.

The project has brought together all the facets of cancer care within the one facility, placing wellness at the spiritual heart of the building. Lines of sight, decision points are all intuitive, logically laid out and very visible at the points of

Working in partnership with your design team and organisation.

entry. “I'm very happy to see the level of understanding of the design intent� says Gray. “The proof will be how well the process works in operational mode�.

The design outcome has provided solid foundations for the creation of an environment in which patients and visitors can move around with comfort, clarity, and clear purpose.

The route for wayshowing Although particularly important for things like medical facilities, good wayfinding remains important to every building; and a successful wayshowing strategy is always going to be the result of collaboration between building designers, architects, building owners and users.

And even though wayfinding deals with many complexities, there is no reason to make it more complex than it really is. As Mollerup explains, “wayshowing should preferably lead to a self-explanatory environment’�, meaning that environments should be as simple as possible in order to minimise confusion of those travelling through the space and to enable easy navigation.

As Einstein phrased it: Do everything as simple as possible, but not simpler".

HERMES IDENTITY wayfinding enhances the interaction within your built environment.

Protecting the overall visual integrity of your site.

telephone: 02 8705 6015 kevin@hermesidentity.com.au www.hermesidentity.com.au

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How Did They Do That?

STEELING THE SHOW

Photo courtesy of Katarina Steube

By Paul Hayes

Tubular ramps used to guide visitors through the building penetrate the pavilion's exterior.

24 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

The Australian Pavilion at World Expo 2010 in Shanghai is a great ambassador for Australian design, manufacturing and construction; employing a world-first use of weathering steel to create its unique façade.

The stakes are high at World Expo 2010. Over the six months from May to October, more than 70 million visitors are expected to pour through the site that spans both banks of Shanghai’s Huangpu River. They will be greeted by over 200 pavilions representing nations and international organisations, all jostling for attention with their dazzling displays of culture and technology.

While it might sound like a theme park experience – and to some extent, that’s exactly what it is – World Expo has a more serious intent. More than just a fun day out for the family, translating the goodwill of the expo into trade and tourism dollars is a high priority.

With so many exhibits across the 5.3 square kilometre site, breaking through this clutter of global proportions is a huge ask. The Australian Pavilion, built close to the expo’s central zone, is a bold, intriguing form that invites further exploration.

An undulating ribbon of steel, 20 metres high, it is reminiscent of Uluru, both in its shape and colour. Like the world-famous rock, the building will change colour over time, thanks to the use of weathering steel as its exterior skin, to create a rich red-ochre that evokes the Australian desert landscape.

Every World Expo has a unifying theme, and in Shanghai it is "Better City,

Photo courtesy of Katarina Steube Image courtesy of Wood/Marsh Architecture

Better Life". With 55% of the world’s population now living in urban environments, exhibitors are showcasing their cities’ diversity, prosperity and technological innovation.

The building has no obvious front, back or sides; instead, its form changes as visitors see it from surrounding streets. The main entry is marked simply with the word “Australia” illuminated in Chinese and English above a glazed tear.

Like Uluru, it is both monolithic in its form and singular in its materiality. The weathering steel façade is rendered as an organic form, curved and coloured as an earthy tone.

Rather than a steel fortress, however, the interior invites visitors into the space and leads them, via the tubular ramps, in and out of the building at various points. The central core of the building is an atrium courtyard space that recalls Australia’s open centre.

The pavilion's exterior cladding employs the Azure cassette system, produced using weathering steel for the first time.

Building Australian in Shanghai Bovis Lend Lease won the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade public tender for construction in November 2008 and began work at the site just a month later. Their first challenge was with the site itself, formerly a multi-use port that had included shipyards and coal loading facility in its day. All of the legacy buildings and infrastructure had to be reduced back to below-grow level before work could begin.

The Australian site was just a part of a much larger project which added additional challenges for access and coordination. All materials for the pavilion had to be shipped through the “Special Import Zone” requirements, an additional part of the process.

“Building for the Australian Government in China created some challenges for us around compliance,” says David Lehmann, managing director at Bovis Lend Lease Shanghai.

“We had to work to two sets of standards, the Australian and the Chinese, and satisfy whichever was higher”. This was put to the test when Think!OTS’s extraordinary designs for the Pavilion’s audio-visual experience, which involves huge moving parts and unprecedented structural forms, proved to be well outside the Chinese standard construction zone.

The safety standards Bovis Lend Lease set are higher that the local industry marketplace. Lehmann adds, “The project involved more than 800,000 man-hours without any lost time, a significant achievement for such a complex project”.

The pavilion’s unique exterior cladding was designed, supplied and project managed by Facade Solutions, a BlueScope Steel business. It employs weathering steel, also known as “corten”.

An alloy is added to the steel which allows it to develop an oxidised layer, or patina, while preventing further corrosion.

“The weathering steel Azure™ façade

will generally last over 50 years, and is effectively maintenance free. However, the use of weathering steel requires technical expertise, as issues arise if it is not designed and installed correctly” said Catherine Jacob General Manager Façade Solutions. While weathering steel is a material often used for projects such as public sculpture, its use in architecture has been more limited, due to the technical difficulty of creating stable joins between panels, which were generally welded on site and could have buckling or corrosion issues. The solution in the case of the Australian Pavilion was to employ the Azure cassette system, which enables panels to interlock without any need for welding. “This unique cassette system is only achievable by using fully automated robotic machinery; a technology that enables exceptional dimensional precision of 0.3mm” Said Steven Halpin, Operations Manager Façade Solutions. The precision is a key ingredient for the stunning result as it offers clean straight lines, tights folds and allows the Azure™cassette system to embrace the curvature of the façade of the Australian Pavilion.

“We can admire the harmonious curved walls, the undulating roofline of the Australian Pavilion without even noticing the Azure cassettes. This is the best way to know that the façade system has fulfilled the intent, and it is clearly what we want… as long as the Architects remember to specify Azure weathering steel for their next project!”

Said Catherine Jacob.

Initial reactions to the pavilion could be gauged during the soft opening phase of the expo in the days before the official opening. The Australian Pavilion was the first building on the site to be completely finished, and one of only ten that were completed before the soft opening phase.

On one day alone, the pavilion attracted 30,000 visitors, a true test of its functionality and a testament to its attractiveness. As a model of contemporary Australian urban design and construction, it already seems to be a hit. | 25

legal column

Contract Risk Management In the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), and with the risk of a ‘double dip’ into recession still lingering, principals are repositioning their exposure to contract risk to try and ensure that enterprise risk is strategically managed.

Risk has been defined as “the chance of an event occurring which would cause actual project circumstances to differ to those assumed when forecasting project benefit and costs”.

Risk naturally sits at the centre of project viability, and therefore efficient management of risk is vital to the success or failure of any construction project. Which is why it has been said that “projects are about risks, their evaluation and their subsequent acceptance or avoidance”.

RISK MANAGEMENT PLANNING Accordingly, it is always advisable that, prior to commencement of any project, the principal is able to quantify both actual and potential risks over the life of that project, as well as the potential losses those risks could impose. This is in order to identify which risks must be most carefully managed over the contract life cycle and to develop management strategies to assume control of, allocate, mitigate or eliminate those risks. Better management of contract risks inevitably means that an organisation can undertake more challenging projects with greater confidence and deliver those projects on time and on budget.

LIFE CYCLE PROFILE It is important to note that the effect of an actual risk occurring is greatly minimised when its likelihood has been foreseen, and effective management strategies have been developed ahead of time to reduce its potential impact and assist both parties to a contract to implement recovery procedures.

Certain periods in the life cycle of a contract present particular risks to projects, and these should have particular attention. They include the tendering process, which needs to be carefully managed to ensure that the relationship starts on a clear and certain footing at the calling of tenders; posttender negotiations, which should be carefully structured to ensure the tender documents and eventual contracts are not confused by random comments; formal board approval, which is a valuable ultimate check that all is in order and unusual risks identified (and justified if appropriate); cost time monitoring, which is a formal external process, often implemented by a project review of cost and time trends, to detect site difficulties and promote early resolutions rather than playing the blame game down the track.

DELIVERY RISK Delivery risk occurs when the practical problems of managing a project’s delivery, present issues not capable of being resolved within the current resource budget.

Managing these risks usually calls for the co-operation of both parties on an informed and involved basis to meet the challenges. Of course, it is important that a public authority does not exceed its agreed range of responsibilities or expenditure when responding to a risk which has been properly outsourced by the contractor.

Like all contract risks, delivery risks must be met and resolved, but within the applicable probity and management guidelines.

26 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

Early intervention is vital and the monitoring of progress, progress claims and the correspondence is essential to an early warning system. As such, contract risk plans and monitoring are becoming more and more popular as a feature of the contracting scene.

MACRO RISK ANALYSIS For significant projects, risk analysis includes a consideration of the risk of a major strategic assumption changing.

This macro risk analysis should always be updated as a project proceeds. Particularly when we experience such events as super profit taxes, which put a variety of projects in doubt, all parties are looking to their potential risks if the contract proceeds as well as their risks if the contract is postponed or cancelled.

For a contractor, the risk associated with cancelling a project can often give rise to un-funded and un-managed exposures.

Furthermore, the risk allocations achieved in warranties and indemnities in regards to the relevant contracts, need to be carefully monitored and reinforced so that the risk allocation in the contract is not obscured by practical day to day conduct in the field.

As a result of all of this, the management of contract risks requires a range of expert assistance, because that assistance makes the difference between projects either being properly risk managed, or simply abandoned to their fate.

Jim Doyle Doyles Construction Lawyers

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straight talk

Since joining Consult Australia (formerly ACEA), Megan Motto has risen quickly through the ranks. In December 2005, Megan was appointed the position of CEO, turning her into one of the most influential figures in the consulting industry. Under Megan's leadership, Consult Australia has undergone progressive changes in all facets of the business including policy and lobbying, commercial growth, and strategic direction. Megan talks candidly to Award about the name change, the tyranny of the cultural norm and why she thinks training as an actor gave her a competitive advantage.

By Lieu Thi Pham

straight talk WITH MEGAN MOTTO CEO, CONSULT AUSTRALIA

AWARD: Hi Megan, your organisation recently had name change from "ACEA" to "Consult Australia". What was the reason?

Megan: There are three main reasons.

The market, which our members work in, has changed substantially over the years.

Because of government outsourcing, the traditional engineering firms are experiencing more competition. To cope with the changes, these firms are now adopting a more multidisciplinary approach to projects. The name 'Association of Consulting Engineers Australia' (ACEA) is now somewhat misleading, as it doesn't suggest that we represent all firms rather than individual professionals. The second reason is to allow us to grow; numbers is power in the lobbying game, and we want to increase our membership 28 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

so that we have a financial base to offer good services to our members.

And thirdly, to differentiate ourselves as an industry association as opposed to a professional organisation (such as Engineerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Australia).

AWARD: You haven't come from a traditional construction or engineering background, do you think this has given you an advantage or disadvantage and why?

Megan: In some ways it's made me work a bit harder and to learn about the industry.

But I think overall it's been an advantage because it means I bring a different perspective to that of the members. At the risk of over-generalising, engineers tend to be very technical and conservative.

Public speaking for example, is something that they're not naturally confident with. I

straight talk

trained five years in public speaking but I also have a performing arts background.

I was a professional dancer and actor in musical theatre. I have to say that the confidence and the physical and mental skills that you learn is invaluable: the discipline, the fact that you have to learn a great deal of information in a short amount of time, having to perform and remember what you're doing, dealing with nerves, staying focused, and learning how to be flexible. Who would have thought that the dancing world and the CEO world shared so much in common!

Teachers are also incredibly undervalued and under-estimated. If you can manage a group of recalcitrant sixteen-year olds, you can manage anything - now that's a great skill set to bring to any workplace.

AWARD: Is it true that the engineering and construction industry is a bit of a boy's club?

Megan: Out of the 270 member firms at Consult Australia, not one, is run by a female CEO. It's very unusual to find women in leadership positions in the firm, particularly in the technical and operational fields. Women seem to be in HR, communications or stakeholder relations. There are a few women in CEO positions, such as Romilly Madew from the Green Building Council of Australia and Jane Montgomery-Hribar from the Australasian Procurement and Construction Council but it's still a boy's club. It's gotten to the stage where I'm sitting in a boardroom of men and I'm oblivious to the fact that I'm the only female.

AWARD: What do you believe the impact of women in construction is?

Megan: The impact is limited due to the sheer numbers of women in the field, but in saying that those that are in the field make, I believe, a big impact. This is because women bring different skills and qualities to their roles that supplements and compliments those already in the

field. I think the involvement of more women in the industry will have an impact on improved communication and reduced disputation for example.

AWARD: Do you believe there is a shortage of women in the industry?

What are your thoughts on why?

Megan: The shortage is quite evident (although for some skills sets like engineering this is true for both men and women), and this is now recognised as a systemic problem in our industry.

A combination of complex factors are contributing to this I believe - a perception that our industry is not female or family friendly or that the culture is very "blokey". Also, female participation in the high level mathematics and physics subjects required to go on to studying engineering is still much lower than that of boys.

AWARD: Are you aware of any issues relating to advancement opportunities and salary in such a male-dominated industry? Do you see any major discrepancies or inequalities in how women and men are treated? What has been your personal experience?

Megan: It is still my experience that women are a little more conservative, they wait until they are 110 per cent confident to do the job, before they apply for the job while guys, even if they're at 70 per cent, they still give it a shot. Men tend to sell themselves up and women tend to sell themselves down a little.

The track record is not consistent in terms of the general topic of women's pay. It's problematic because board positions are offered through word-ofmouth as an information avenue and people tend to look around their own network and recommend someone in their own circle. It's the tyranny of the cultural norm. We surround ourselves with people who are like us, so for this industry, the status quo tends to perpetuate itself. Diversity is an issue right across the board, not just in terms of gender, but ethnicity and age as well.

AWARD: What do you think has been done to promote and encourage diversity in the workplace?

Megan: In terms of diversity, many of our members have mentoring programs that exist for women in leadership positions.

One of our member firms, were one of the first to ever introduce any kind of paid maternity leave, and we now have firms that are introducing best-practice programs in terms of paid parental leave.

There are parts of the industry that have cultural programs, especially some of the bigger firms which are very sophisticated and evolved in their thinking. I look forward to seeing more great initiatives in terms of promoting diversity in the workplace.

AWARD: What is your association doing to promote this industry to women?

Megan: Our schools based DVD "Engineering - Design Your World" is geared to both boys and girls, and profiles young female engineers to inspire the next generation. We also couple this up with school visits, which are often conducted by women in our young professionals program. We also discuss best practice with regards to attracting and retaining women in our industry, and this is shared by all members through our Practice Notes.

AWARD: What challenges have you faced as an executive female in this industry; what can be done to ensure that future women in this field do not encounter the same challenges?

Megan: I have to say I have not come across a huge amount of overt gender discrimination or bias in the industry.

That's not to say there haven't been a few inappropriate comments made from time to time, but I'm generally too thick skinned to worry about those (you have to be to go into executive positions anyway), and in any case most of the guys around the table are more horrified than I am so there is much more support than negativity. | 29

TECHNOLOGY column

Photo courtesy of Ginette Snow

The AirVolution of Technology

An aerial view of the redevelopment of Canberra International Airport showing the multi- stage nature of the project at work.

It is only 11 years ago that the Canberra Airport was purchased from the Federal Government. I use the word ‘only’ as in that time an enormous amount of investment and development has gone into the airport. Initially, the existing airport terminal and its operations were upgraded in a number of phases.

Masterplanning for the future operations of domestic passenger, international passenger and freight transport then took place. A major step was then taken to extend and upgrade the runway facilities.

At the start of 2005, the airport embarked on an ‘AirVolution’.

This involved planning and developing a whole new series of airport buildings to completely replace the existing airport buildings and operations. In January 2005 GMB Architects were successful in a design competition for the new facilities and so began the planning and development of: A new passenger terminal in the order of 60,000 square metres; a joint investment with the ACT Government to upgrade the roads leading to and past the airport; two new structured carparks with 1,200 car spaces each; two 5,000 square metre office areas; two surface-level car parks; an elevated axial road system; a new taxi road facility; a new apron to the terminal; and the redevelopment of a number of buildings to allow for the construction of the new terminal.

All of this is taking place while the existing airport remains open and operational. This is a significant achievement in itself as all the new works are taking place over the footprint of the existing operations. The demolition and staging of the works has therefore been a major task for the airport project team. Currently, the works are approximately half way through completion and construction is advancing at a very significant pace.

Early in the design and documentation phases Construction Control recognised the value in appointing an experienced shop drawing consultant to the project team; namely MultiCAD. The value in this approach was to enable a single co-ordinated approach to shop detailing whilst also allowing consistent and reliable communications with the project team; the facilitation of a timely response to construction phase priorities; the coordination of electronic file exchange in a consistent manner; and the provision of early feedback to the architects and engineers before any major issues are able to arise.

30 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

There have already been a number of significant advantages shown with this approach. For example, the structured carparks have facades of perforated metal and stairs of exposed steelwork.

As exposed structures, the coordination of detailing throughout is vital to achieve a high quality architectural outcome. MultiCAD have built their 3D models and exported these to GMB Architects in Tekla Webviewer format for scrutiny before shop drawings were completed. The architects were able to navigate around and through the 3D models. This has been an invaluable interactive tool in identifying a number of elements that required adjustment before shop drawings are completed. The result has been that the project has an accurate set of shop drawings that align with the design’s architectural intent; detailing issues in the early shop drawing phase have been resolved; costly and time consuming site corrections to steelwork have been eliminated; and the final finish of the exposed steelwork is better due to site patching being eliminated For the city of Canberra, ‘AirVolution’ will be a major part of the city’s economic infrastructure for growth in passenger and freight transport. The airport’s aim is to develop the best ‘small’ airport in the world. The architecture of the new buildings has aspired to this aim and the first phases of construction are already showing that this extraordinary aim will be realised. Canberra Airport is becoming a high quality and very appropriate gateway into Australia’s capital.

For more information about this article, please visit www.awardmagazine.com.au/featurededitorial Paul Mutton Guida Moseley Brown Architects

geometry design

The Challenge: High-Performance Buildings The Solution: Bentley

Image courtesy HKR Architects

Image courtesy CH2MHill (B-W Pantex-HVAC Design)

BUILDING INFORMATION MODELLING & MORE Software for the design, construction, and operation of all types of buildings and facilities around the world, from the conventional to some of the most inspiring projects of our time.

For projects small to large, simple to complex, each discipline-specific application provides an informed work environment – from conceptual design through documentation, to coordination and construction.

BUILDING ENERGY DESIGN, ANALYSIS & SIMULATION Bentley’s building performance software applications provide the fastest, most powerful, and most accurate design, analysis and simulation available for building load, plant energy, passive design, and dynamic thermal simulations.

Bentley’s comprehensive suite of software helps professionals productively deliver sustainable high-performance buildings.

GENERATIVE DESIGN SOFTWARE GenerativeComponents® (GC) enables architects and engineers to pursue designs and achieve results that were virtually unthinkable before.

GC facilitates the delivery of inspired sustainable buildings, freedom in form finding, use of innovative materials, exploration of “what-if” alternatives for even the most complex designs.

Open a world of new possibilities while you work more productively than ever before.

www.bentley.com/AW_buildings © 2009 Bentley Systems, Incorporated. Bentley, the “B” Bentley logo, and GenerativeComponents are either registered or unregistered trademarks or service marks of Bentley Systems, Incorporated or one of its direct or indirect wholly-owned subsidiaries. Other brands and product names are trademarks of their respective owners.

geometry sustainability generative components architecture

geometry

generative

design sustainability geometry

components

sustainability

architecture

generative

components architecture

geometry

architecture

design

Image courtesy Thompson, Ventulett, & Associates

Technology

The March of Technology

The recently completed AAMI Park featured a project team of 790 people (representing 250 organisations), generated 230,000 mail items and 420,000 documents. The project's online collaboration system was vital to the efficent management and delivery of the stadium.

Rendering courtesy of Cox Architects

By Mark Kenfield

TECHNOLOGY IS A fascinating thing, we often praise and despise it at the same time. When it allows us to save ourselves time, or improve the efficiency or cost of doing things – we love it. When we’ve become dependent on those efficiencies and have an issue with them – we revile it.

It has worked its way into almost every facet of our daily lives. Imagine trying to conduct business in this day and age without email or Google to help you along; imagine being restricted to landlines for telephone communication.

And ask yourself, could you honestly go about your daily routine as easily as you do now? Where would these restrictions hold you up? Where would they cost you time?

The design and construction industry is no different. There are simply certain technologies we’ve become dependent on; in many cases technology, or techniques enabled by technology, without which many projects wouldn’t be financially viable these days.

32 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

Large, dispersed project teams (often with hundreds of participants); higher volumes of information to manage (with some projects involving literally hundreds of thousands of documents and communications); and a highly competitive market – all fuel a greater need for efficiency and accountability than ever before.

“Traditionally, the construction industry has used a combination of hard copies, email, fax, FTP sites and in-house systems to manage project information” explains Aconex General Manager, Steve Brant. “However these tools were intended for corporate environments and so, when applied to the project environment, are often not up to the task

Technology

and leave companies open to the risk of delays, errors and disputes”.

As email grew exponentially more popular in the latter half of the 90s, its sheer convenience meant that it had to be adopted. However, although it’s fine for casual communication, it really is too unreliable a method of communication for projects as large and complex as construction. on a typical project there are hundreds or thousands of documents handed between parties, and the risk of losing some of those documents in the process is very considerable.

Three of the main technologies that have seen considerable growth in adoption rates in recent years, particularly on larger projects worth over $50 million, are building Information modelling (BIM), Computer Aided Design (CAD), and online Collaboration Systems.

BIM software enables the data from building components to be imported directly into a project’s design files, and present 3D models of those components in-place within the design. It also allows detailed imagery and information to be attached to designs – which then become immediately accessible and available to everyone involved in the building process. “logistically this can offer projects massive savings in time,” explains Pacific Computing’s Paul McLeod, “and as a result can greatly reduce costs as well, as it updates and informs the entire building team on the latest design changes”.

CAD software provides the means to accurately model projects in both 2D and 3D formats, allowing component clashes and tolerances to be fine-tuned in order to maximise design efficiency.

This can greatly help to bridge the gap between the key stakeholders involved in a project, by providing the capacity for everyone to stay up to date with the latest updates to the design.

Online Collaboration Systems provide a web-based platform for managing the large, complex flow of information on construction and engineering projects.

“For projects to be completed on time and within budget, close collaboration between a network of organisations is required” explains Brant, “Typically, these companies will generate large volumes of information – such as drawings, documents and correspondence – that will need to be efficiently managed and controlled”.

By having online systems that streamline these processes through the

use of the Internet you can greatly reduce the need for paper documents and individual email accounts by allowing companies to share, track, distribute and store their information centrally, using a single project-based system.

In this way, all of your project information is managed in a secure archive that is available from any location and at any time. “by entering a few simple keywords,” Brant adds, “users can find their most current information in just a few seconds – as opposed to looking through multiple files, formats and locations with no guarantee that the information is up-to-date”.

These systems maintain a full audit trail of every document and mail transaction involved over the course of a project, which allows companies to easily track ‘who did what and when’. In this way it becomes possible to reduce the costs associated with paper documents, such as couriers, admin hours, printing and storage; save time by providing all parties with fast, easy access to project files; and lower a project’s exposure to risks such as delays and disputes.

So the benefits of these technologies are obviously significant, but why then has their uptake not been both rapid and universal?

Brant believes that this is largely due to the Australian construction industry not always being quick to change their processes. “We’ve been very aware of this from day one,” he says, “so we made sure our system mirrors standard industry processes as much as possible.

Our system isn’t designed to change how organisations work; just to make standard processes much more efficient by moving them online”.

Bentley System’s Fergus Dunn, believes that the main areas where issues arise are either contractual or technical, or sometimes both, which can lend to firms' inability to trust and share information with others.

Dunn says that most companies want to adopt BIM or collaboration systems, but do not know how to, so when they eventually do, they find that there are time pressures, which lead to project goals being watered down or disregarded, and process being thrown out. “Software like BIM is a process not a product” he says, “I think too often, firms arrive at the belief that a single software product is the answer to their challenges. So any time those expectations are not met,

word spreads and the uptake is slowed down”.

Inevitably, there will always be some companies that are wary of change.

However the belief is that this wariness will die out as companies become more familiar with these technologies, and see the project-wide benefits that they can bring. Brant believes that industry education is an important part of this, “our academic program is bringing the benefits of collaboration technology to construction and engineering students,” he says, “this way, they are entering the market with an understanding and an expectation that these tools will be available to them”.

Wariness and barriers aside though, uptake is increasing rapidly. “We estimate that around 35% of projects in Australia are built using some type of collaboration system,” Brant says, “and in more mature markets such as the UK and US, that number is closer to 50%”. The belief is that it will eventually become an industry standard to use these systems, with few projects being undertaken without one.

So where is all this headed?

Dunn hopes that it will lead the industry towards a foundation principal of ‘Federated Interoperability’. "Real world project information resides in multiple locations, with multiple authors working in multiple formats, needing to coordinate and manage information" he says, "A Federated approach, as opposed to a monolithic one, allows different project stakeholders to access, create, reference and publish the information they need in a way that maximises the value they are able to add, while at the same time, facilitating the effective reuse of project information across both the project and asset lifecycles".

Brant is particularly hopeful that, in time, there will be a fusion of BIM products with web-based collaboration systems.

“Just as web-based collaboration systems have enabled real-time document editing and tracking, there will come a point where we will no longer rely on 2D frozen documents issued at a particular time” he says, “eventually, we may well have a live, evolving model that can be edited by project team members via the web, while retaining an audit trail of all changes”.

It’s an exciting time for our industry, and the relentless march of technology looks set to keep things interesting for a long time to come. | 33

industry matters

GECA ANNOUNCES NEW BUILDING PRODUCT STANDARDS “The new standards offer clear and transparent benchmarks that all products within a category must meet; this allows all products within a product category, to be assessed on an equal basis”.

Good Environmental Choice Australia is gearing up to release the new GECA 2010 suite of environmental product standards for the building industry; these will be due for release as early as July.

This new series of GECA standards will make it easier for specifiers to select products that are better environmental performers.

The GECA 2010 suite of standards has been created in close consultation with a broad range of stakeholders, including scientists and other experts. The objective of each standard is to incorporate globally competitive benchmarks to help measure the environmental performance of Australian products, and to reward audited products that achieve best practice performance and above.

The standards that will be released are: • GECA 28 – Furniture and Fittings 2010; • GECA 50 – Carpets 2010; • GECA 04 – Panel Boards 2010; and • GECA 25 – Floor Coverings 2010.

The GECA 2010 suite of standards will continue our clear-cut, ‘all boxes must be ticked’ approach. GECA offers a single, platinum level performance certification.

This means that environmental criteria cannot be cherry picked through a system of alternative tiered certifications (e.g. bronze, silver, gold). According to GECA’s Standards Manager, “A product is either less damaging to the environment than its competitors, or it is not. We’re seeking to certify the products that are independently assessed as ‘best in class’”.

The new standards offer clear and transparent benchmarks that all products within a product category must meet;

34 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

this allows all products within a product category, to be assessed on an equal basis.

Each standard also includes a new ‘evidence list’ section to help the audit processes be clearer and more transparent, reducing uncertainty and therefore the overall cost of the certification process. We are also continuing our transition to multiple JAS-ANZ accredited auditors by March 2011.

Some of the features of products certified by GECA under the new suite of standards include: environmentally preferable sourcing; low toxicity; lower greenhouse footprint, low indoor environmental air and water emissions; design for disassembly; an anti-greenwash commitment; and product stewardship.

Like all of our standards, the 2010 suite will be publically available for download, and anyone can provide feedback on the standards. All of our standards are created in accordance with international guidelines for environmental declarations.

The standards seek to recognise recent product innovations with respect to manufacturing efficiency, lower greenhouse and hazardous substance emissions, safer materials, increases in recycled content, and sourcing of alternative materials. This means that the products we certify will have an even lower environmental impact and be even safer for both humans and the environment.

The standards also introduce new antigreenwash requirements for claims made beyond the scope of our independently assessed certifications.

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Market Analysis

By Matthias Krups & Brooke Barr BCI Australia

As the financial year draws to a close, it calls for a review of the year just past, and look at the year ahead. Looking into the performance of the Australian multiresidential sector provides a good general overview of the building market in 2010/2011.

SECTOR ANALYSIS

The latest BCI Australia information shows us that the multi-residential sector lagged behind most other sectors in the months preceding the Global Financial Crisis.

However, unlike any other sector, it didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t suffer the same falls others did in the early part of 2009. In response to early optimism regarding the economy, nearly $11 billion worth of new projects were proposed in Q3/2009. And although the fourth quarter saw a distinct fall in projects, the value of proposed projects is expected to even out at levels slightly above what they were in 2008. Typical projects are highly ambitious and often are part of larger

urban redevelopment projects. The proposed $250 million 200 unit residential tower in Brisbane, and the $129 million 601 unit apartment complex in Homebush Bay are prime examples of this.

As a result of low investor confidence and cautious lending practices, many large unit and high-rise ventures failed to go ahead in 2009, with the value of construction starts significantly declining over the course of the year.

From here on out however, the forecast looks positive, with the multi-residential sector expected to bounce back stronger than most other categories as the economy steadily improves and housing demand picks up again.

Multi-Residential Projects Outlook

construction starts multi-residential

36 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

multi-residential forecast

State Analysis

In Victoria this year, multi-residential projects are showing positive signs. With $2.32 billion in new multi-residential projects since 1st January 2010. In addition to this, the value of multi-residential projects commencing construction this year is $1.56 billion (compared to just $608 million for the same period last year). This aligns with our national forecast that residential and aged care sectors are the best placed for the construction industry to target in the 2010/2011 financial year.

The proposed $350 million 513 apartment, 43 storey tower building in Southbank, and the $270 million 476 residential units at the Nova Centre in Clayton, are prime examples of confidence returning to the residential market in Victoria.

In New South Wales there has been $1.58 billion in new multi-residential projects this year. Compared to just $83 million in the same period in 2009. The sector has also showed $588 million in projects commencing construction since 1st January 2010.

Key projects that will allow the sector to keep progressing are the proposed $580 million Telopea Urban Renewal Project in Telopea, which will consist of 1.900 apartments.

And the $129 million Bay Park project in Homebush Bay, consisting of 601 apartments.

Queensland has seen the proposal of $1.3 billion in new projects since the start of the year. Of which the largest is the $250 million Residential Tower in Brisbane, which will consist of 200 apartments. Submissions for the towerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s design competition opened in May. Construction commencements totaled $299 million in this period for the sector. Adding to this was the $40 million Verve project in The Gap, which commenced construction in March 2010, and consists of 66 units.

In South Australia there has been $198 million in new multi-residential projects since January 1st (compared to $37 million for the same period a year earlier). The Woodville West Urban Renewal project in Woodville West, made a large contribution to the sector. The $130 million project is proposed to include 425 affordable dwellings with initial funding allocated from the State & Federal Governments.

South Australia also added $77 million of construction commencements in other multi-residential projects.

Western Australia has revealed $610 million in new multi-residential projects this year. With the state also showing $158 million worth of projects commencing construction in 2010. The $30 million Aspect project in East Perth, began construction in February; the 137 apartment project is expected to continue construction for the next 13 months.

AWARDWORTHY: Melbourne Airport

Taking Off: Melbourne Airport T2 Expansion

The inexorable march of time has something of a tendency to supersede things, and so it was, that two and half years ago, the venerable Boeing 747 saw itself surpassed as the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s largest passenger airliner by the double-decker Airbus A380.

38 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

an in-bound baggage handling capacity upgrade (with construction currently completed) the second is known as Project Gatesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; which provides 5 new gates for international arrivals and departures (3 of which are currently operational, and 2 of which can service A380s); and the third, which provides a significant expansion to passenger processing, expanded outbound baggage handling capacity and a large increase to the retail space in the international terminal (the passenger processing is currently operational, the new retail spaces and baggage handling facilities are being fitted-out).

Opening the Gates John Holland was awarded the contract as a Managing Contractor back

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That same never-ending march also brings with it forecasted increases in both passenger numbers and in plane traffic.

And in response to these key drivers, Melbourne Airport has embarked upon a $330 million expansion of its International Terminal (T2), the largest expansion to the terminal since it was originally built back in the late 1960s.

The expansion has been driven by three key objectives; the first being to improve and expand the airportâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s international processing and terminal facilities; the second being to increase gate capacity and improve the ability to service the new A380s; and the third being to upgrade the baggage system.

As such, the expansion has been divided into three separate projects. The first is

The Gates Project is not a heavily articulated building; it’s elegant and simple; the design intent was to create a façade that had long clean lines, and to use materials similar to the airport’s existing palette.

in November 2007, at which stage the first project’s design was essentially complete and Project Gates was roughly at the end of its design development stage.

“It was a Managing Contract with a novated designer,” explains John Holland’s Operations Manager, Robert Normand. “So we picked up the obligation to manage the remainder of the design and built the three different stages”.

Project Gates is a large, three-level, mostly elevated structure which connects to the existing T2 International Satellite building at Departures and Arrivals Level. It provides aircraft docking for five new aircraft positions, facilitate bridged departures and arrivals to and from these aircraft and to provide direct connection from the existing T2 terminal for passenger circulation. The new concourse has been designed to maximize parking space for aircraft and will provide close views of runway activity.

Three of the five new gates will have dual-level aerobridges able to accommodate one super-sized Airbus A380 or two smaller aircraft. These aerobridges will enable passengers to simultaneously embark/ disembark on both levels of the A380 aircraft.

The designers on the project were Architectus, who were brought in for their earlier work designing Gates 9 and 11 for the A380 aircraft and other experience at Melbourne Airport on a number of projects. “The design starting point was to create comfortable, pleasurable spaces for both passengers and staff,” explains Architectus Director Ruth Wilson. “The large spaces are heated and cooled through the floor slab, and there is an abundance of natural light, automated blinds track sun movement to provide any necessary shading. Materials have been chosen for their longevity and low ‘off-gassing’. Other environmental initiatives included in the design are rainwater harvesting, solar hot water, and low energy lighting fixtures”.

“Our goal with the Gates Project was to look at how we could create a calm environment for passengers both arriving and departing,” continues Wilson. “The point at which a passenger arrives at a gate should be a very serene environment; they should be calming down before getting on the plane”.

Arriving passengers pass through a glazed, elevated walkway in the departure lounge and are able to see those departing. The double height departure lounge affords views out to the docked aircraft and runway beyond. The spaces are serene, and the passenger flows clear and intuitive, supporting efficient circulation as well as providing a calming environment for excited, weary or anxious travellers.

“Visually, the most overriding aspect of the project is the view out to the aircraft and the runway,” says Wilson, “you get really close to the docking planes”. The view is of a very big, very dry, very flat landscape and big blue sky - we've tried to capture those views as you walk through the building”.

The new Gates project is not a heavily articulated building; it’s elegant and simple; “Externally, we looked at the airport and decided to create a façade that had long clean lines,” explains Wilson, “using materials similar to the existing palette of the airport, but in cleaner more elegant manner”.

A Busy Place to Build Providing for the operational needs of the airport was the primary challenge during the construction. “You can't stop an international airport,” says Rob Normand, “it's a detailed day-by-day interaction with the airport’s 24/7 operations to ensure that your proposed work can proceed while regular operations continue. And of course you end up with a stack of out-of-hours work, modified work zones, modified work procedures and all of those things. If you need modified work

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Photo courtesy of Melbourne Airport

Photo courtesy of Melbourne Airport

Main: The $330 million expansion of Melbourne Airport’s international terminal is the largest expansion to the terminal since it was originally built back in the late 1960s. iT adds extensive capacity to deal with forecasted increases in both passenger numbers and in plane traffic.

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AWARDWORTHY: Melbourne Airport

Higher Boarding Obviously one of the biggest benefits of the new gates is their ability to service the Airbus A380s, which require aerobridges for both the upper and lower decks. RATE Aerobridges were contracted to provide the aerobridges to Project Gates. “The specification called for bridges to serve everything from 737s up to A380s,” explains RATE’s Peter Reidy. “So we provided dual-bridge gates, which allow you to service either both decks of an A380 or for two smaller single-deck planes”.

“These are the first A380 gates we've put in Australia,” Reidy says, “the difference with our upper bridges is that we have a standard apron drive bridge connected at one end to the building, with wheels at the aircraft end to facilitate

moving the end of it around”.

The bridges go as high as 8.5m in the air to service the big Airbuses, at which point regular bridges could easily become unstable. To counteract this, the bridges have a dual boogie arrangement, with two pairs of wheels at the base to provide the necessary stability.

With the flexibility to service everything from an A380 upper deck 8.5m in the air, to a 737 which is just 2m off the ground, the new aerobridges offer a considerable expansion in operational range when compared to regular bridges. They also supply preconditioned air to the aircraft whilst they’re on the ground.

Guiding the planes into the gates is a special laser-guided docking system, which was provided by Thorn Airfield Lighting. “The system uses lasers to detect the position of the aircraft on the apron,” explains Thorn’s Project Manager Christiaan Schenk, “as each plane approaches the terminal, the system tells the pilots whether they need to move left or right and provides the stopping distance to their marks”.

Landing on Schedule The timeframe for coordinating Project Gates was very tight, leaving little avenue for any downtime in the procurement of trades, receiving of documentation, tendering, recommending and awarding each sub-contract.

Transporting people, materials and equipment safely to the work site also required continuous vigilance and precise logistics.

But thanks to the high levels of communication between the project team, the time, cost and quality objectives of the project were all met; whilst the many site-specific hazards were carefully avoided. In all, a smooth landing.

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Safe Travelling With total number of man-hours worked on the project sitting in excess of 800,000, and the project involving a number of major safety concerns, careful assessment of working conditions on-site was required throughout the construction. John Holland put together a ‘No Harm’ vision for the project, which encompassed a core belief that all injuries are preventable. On Project Gates, they were able to achieve this vision through improved occupational health and safety knowledge, awareness and understanding, along with the support of robust management systems with clear accountability and guidance.

“The majority of the safety considerations were heavily orientated to the sensitive airside environment,” explains Rob Normand. “The wealth of experiences in the planning, design and site teams has enabled us to identify any high risk activities during the construction phase and adequately mitigate them through engineering and elimination processes to ensure that every task is carried out safely”.

Given the sensitivity of the airport’s airside operations, the entire project team was committed to implementing their safety procedures both within the site boundaries and the surrounding live airport environment. Active involvement and regular communication were applied to ensure that Melbourne Airport’s additional safety procedures were met. In addition to this, all personnel on the project were given site-specific inductions with the main emphasis on the safety aspects of working in an airside environment.

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equipment, say a crane for example, you need approvals for that. On top of all of that, the airport employs thousands of workers; all of whom come from separate groups (i.e. baggage handlers come from a different group from the service people etc.) So there is a whole myriad of stakeholders you have to work with”.

Building on to an existing structure that is already complicated from previous renovations and additions is always going to be a real challenge.

The first project had bored piles, and the original design suggested there would be one bored pile per column, however it turned out there were a number of unidentified sewer lines in the same location, so the designs for the new foundation system clashed with this.

“We had to redesign the foundations from single bored piles to multiple micro piles.” explains Normand, “We needed to do enough site measuring to sort out where everything was, and come up with a solution that would fit within the other construction projects all affecting the program”.

The double height departure lounge affords views out to the docked aircraft and runway beyond. The space is designed to feel serene, with clear passenger flows and which help provide a calming environment for excited, weary or anxious travellers.

Photo by Mark Kenfield

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40 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

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Setting New Standards with AS 5007 In September 2007, Standards Australia released a new automatic door standard entitled AS5007 “Powered doors for pedestrian access and egress”. Replacing the 1992 Standard AS4085, the new Standard focuses on standardising the “design, installation, test and safety requirements of all automatic pedestrian door assemblies.”

The DORMA EL301 and HD operators are the first automatic sliding door operators compliant and accredited with AS5007.

EL301 & HD automatic operators are certified by an independent NATA accredited laboratory.

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Movable Walls

Service

Accessibility Column

But it’s existing…

Refurbishment works in existing buildings invariably generates the question, ”What level of access do we need to provide for people with disabilities?“ It could be assumed that this is a relatively simple question; however, the history and evolution of the relevant legislative requirements has precluded a simple answer.

The main object of the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) (1992) is to eliminate discrimination as far as possible across a number of areas. The Act is predominantly concerned with the issue of access to premises and the facilities offered within. Any premises that allow for public access must also provide suitable access to people with disabilities. The means access must be provided according to the existing Australian standards that relate to access for people with disabilities. Although there are numerous standards associated with various building elements, there are two which are particularly important for providing information on how building elements should be provided, these are: the AS 1428 Part 1 (2009) General requirements for access – New building work, and the AS 1428 Part 2 (1992) Enhanced and additional requirements – Building and facilities.

When considering access requirements from the perspective of Building Code of Australia (BCA) (2010), it is important to note that the superseded version of Part 1 is in fact referenced, and that Part 2 is not referenced at all. Furniture and fitment items are not currently included in Part 1 and they therefore consequently sit outside the confines of the BCA. The other significant difference is that the referenced version of Part 1 generally outlines circulation requirements intended to meet the needs of 80 per cent of all powered and manual wheelchairs, while Part 2 encompasses up to the 90th percentile.

Currently, a building permit associated with an existing building’s structure or its internal and external layout will also trigger the BCA requirements for access. This essentially means that an old building, in which no significant building works are undertaken, may never be required to provide adequate access. Of course this does not absolve owners and managers of their responsibilities under the DDA which clearly communicates that all public buildings must be accessible regardless of the building’s age.

This discrepancy between the two sets of legislation has caused substantial confusion for architects, designers, builders, owners and building managers, as well as people with disabilities. In response to this, a separate standard has been recently tabled with parliament and a response has been made public by the Government.

This standard, Disability (Access to Premises - Buildings) Standards (2010), is intended to be a codification of the requirements under the DDA; one of its main objectives is to provide certainty to the construction industry that their responsibilities under the DDA will be met if the requirements of this standard are satisfied.

The Government’s response has stated that this standard will be active from 1 May 2011. The ‘Access Code for Buildings’ within it will effectively replace the current contents of section D3 in the 2011 edition of the BCA. 42 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

Under this standard, all new buildings will of course need to meet the new standard, as will all “New Parts” of existing buildings which includes extended or modified parts of an existing building. “Affected Parts” of buildings are defined as the principal entry of an existing building that contains a new part, as well as the path of travel from the entry to the new part. “Affected Parts” will also require access.

In the interest of reducing the cost of implementing access in existing buildings, a number of concessions have been made. These concessions include: • A lessee concession – building work by a lessee to a new part of the building will not see the ”affected parts” requiring access under the standard; • A lift concession – an existing lift within a ”new part” or ”affected part” of a building which does not travel more than 12m, will not require modifications to meet the increased floor space required (i.e. 1400mm X 1600mm).

• A toilet concession – existing accessible sanitary facilities and compartments within a new or affected part of an existing building will not require modifications where it meets the requirements of the superseded AS 1428 Part 1 (2001).

For more information about this article, please visit www. awardmagazine.com.au/featured editorial

George Xinos Blythe-Sanderson Group

ASSOCIATION MATTERS

Green retrofits do you have the energy?

A new report has found that Australia can reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to 25 per cent below 2000 levels by 2020 using technologies that are available today - all at an average annual cost of AUD$185 per household.

According to ClimateWorks’ Low Carbon Growth Plan, the most costeffective abatement opportunity is retrofitting commercial buildings such as offices, shopping centres, schools, public buildings and hospitals. The easiest ‘win’ is removing, replacing or downsizing inefficient equipment to reduce energy waste. This is followed by retrofitting heating, ventilation and cooling systems, appliances, lighting, water heating and insulation. Around three quarters of the emissions reduction opportunities identified are profitable to investors, even without a carbon price.

Of Australia’s 21 million square metres of existing office stock, 81 per cent is more than ten years old. That’s a huge opportunity for green retrofits. In fact, research by Davis Langdon has confirmed

that 1.7 million tonnes of CO2 could be saved every year by retrofitting office stock more than 20 years old to achieve NABERS 4.5 Star ratings. This 38 per cent improvement in energy efficiency would be equal to removing more than 250,000 cars from Australian roads.

Building energy performance reporting is certainly the next big frontier for buildings.

Mandatory disclosure of energy efficiency ratings for office buildings over 2000 square metres, at time of sale or lease, commences in July.

The federal government’s legislation will force existing building owners to look at green retrofitting options in order to improve their buildings’ energy efficiency, remain compliant, keep tenant interest and avoid obsolescence.

The Green Building Council of Australia is supportive of the new scheme, and would like the government to consider how mandatory disclosure could be expanded to capture other aspects of commercial buildings’ environmental performance, such as water efficiency.

Meeting compliance requirements is only half the story. As the demand for green building stock continues to climb, building owners will need to be able to demonstrate their buildings’ environmental credentials.

Tenants are certainly beginning to recognise the benefits of operating from green buildings. We now have solid evidence which confirms that green buildings increase everything from office productivity and reputational equity to retail sales and performances on school tests. We also know that green buildings decrease carbon emissions and energy usage, waste management costs, water usage and absenteeism. As more tenants look for environmentally sustainable, healthy and productive workspaces, the last thing owners and managers want is a building that doesn’t meet today’s high standard.

Romilly Madew Chief Executive, Green Building Council of Australia

ACA is dedicated to improving safety performance ACA member companies consider themselves industry leaders. As constructors we have a statutory and commercial responsibility for delivering responsible and effective workplace health and safety performance.

But member companies would also accept that each has a moral responsibility to protect the health and safety of all that work on, or who visit a project under their control.

Improving safety performance has always been a major goal for ACA since its formation in 1994 and safety is a standing agenda item at every ACA Board meeting.

There was a time in our industry when safety performance was treated as a competitive issue. Not any more. In fact ACA has now decided that a condition of membership is the obligation to share safety data.

The ACA Board is concerned that fatalities in the industry are far too high and despite investment in systems, technology, training and education we are not making a sig-

nificant in-roads in moving fatalities towards a zero goal.

The ACA Board has taken the threshold decision to take more of a leadership role on safety but we are mindful that this needs to be backed by concrete steps.

The steps taken include a mix of “hard” positive improvements and “softer” improved communications. The latter can support the former. Pursuing only the latter without the former will be counter productive. The steps proposed represent such a balance.

The ACA safety objective is an Australian construction industry free of fatalities, permanent personal damage and injuries.

We have established a board level Safety Committee. There are eight CEOs who have volunteered to form the inaugural committee which has now met on a number of occasions.

ACA is in the process of establishing high-level expert subcommittees in the following areas: • Electrical work • Working at heights

• Working near mobile equipment • Risks from traffic at brownfield civil construction sites Board members have been appointed as mentors for each of our action teams.

Each subcommittee has been asked to research and analyse fatalities and incidents resulting in permanent injury, determine contemporary best practice to control/eliminate risks, determine recommendations for further ACA action.

At the end of the day we want to identify those practices with the potential to eliminate fatalities and those injuries that result in permanent disability. We will then focus on implementation of change and then monitor progress.

We will mobilise the expertise of Australia’s major contractors and we are committed to achieving results.

Jim Barrett Executive Director Australian Constructors Association | 43

ASSOCIATION MATTERS

$350,000 for the Australian National Engineering Taskforce On 30 March 2010, the then Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, announced that the Australian National Engineering Taskforce (ANET) would receive $350,000 to conduct two projects which would quantify the shortage of engineers in two Australian sectors and create strategies for intervention.

ANET was established by Australia’s peak engineering employer, industrial, professional and academic organisations to develop and implement strategies to overcome blockages in national engineering skills supply and capacity. ANET’s contributing bodies are Consult Australia (formerly the ACEA), the Association of Professional Engineers, Scientists and Managers Australia (APESMA), Engineers Australia (EA), the Australian Council of Engineering Deans (ACED) and the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE).

The first of the two projects being conducted will assess the current and future capacity and requirements of the engineering workforce in road and rail – two key Australian sectors. The research will produce findings on the scope and nature of engineering skills requirements across both public and private sectors from project development to project execution.

The project will identify and quantify the full range of engineering workforce development issues including obstacles and likely solutions at the workplace, enterprise, and industry levels, and within the education and training sectors.

The second project to receive funding will review practices and policies in engineering education with the existing higher education articulation/transition practices to assess the suitability, benefits and drawbacks in VET. From an industry, education sector and commu-

nity perspective, the project will apply measures of success and will consider industry demands, state and regional differences, and the opportunities for increased and more effective industry and employer engagement. The project will build on existing research and identify best practice, as well as identify recommendations for future work.

Outcomes from these projects will improve job skills development, and contracting and procurement models, as well as inform government, industry and the education sector on future ANET projects in the areas of immigration, recruitment and retention strategies.

Caroline Ostrowski National Policy Officer Consult Australia

Precast offers best cost performance Recent recognition by the quantity surveying profession that precast flooring is by far the most cost effective solution in a range of applications, has provided unbiased research that proves the case. In the September 2009 issue of the AIQS’s The Building Economist, academic and quantity surveyor Anthony Mills investigates the `best cost performance’ and possible `best design practice’ for structural frames in buildings in Australia. Based on costing a number of standardised building frame designs in five Australian cities, the study clearly shows the use of precast (and in particular precast flooring) to be the most cost efficient design in the study1.

There are several precast flooring options available: Hollowcore flooring is prestressed precast concrete planks, generally 1200mm wide and between 100 and 400mm thick, which have hollow cores along their length.

Hollowcore can be topped with 44 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

concrete or left untopped, depending on application.

Beam-and-infill flooring, commonly known as Ultrafloor. This system comprises inverted prestressed T-section beams of up to 250mm deep which can span up to 12m and are in-filled with fibre cement or metal infill and topped with concrete.

Lattice girder flooring, more often known as Transfloor or Humeslab – and is generally available in widths of up to 2500mm and spans up to 10m.

Acting as permanent formwork, the partial precast concrete slabs with projecting steel ‘lattice girders’ are topped with concrete.

Bubbledeck flooring – reinforced slabs where recycled plastic bubbles replace concrete, providing another lightweight flooring solution with up to 35% reduction in dead weight.

Floor thicknesses of between 230 and 450mm can span up to 15m.

Precast flooring offers a number of “key” benefits other than just a smart

financial solution for multi-storey buildings; acoustic and fire resistance features, GreenStar credits, longer spans, and they are fast to erect.

All of these flooring solutions offer benefits other than just a smart financial solution for multi-storey buildings. There are acoustic benefits and fire resistance benefits. For GreenStar credits, precast flooring uses less concrete in its production (dematerialisation) than comparable insitu concrete solutions. Longer spans allow design flexibility with column-free areas and maximised lettable space. As well, they are fast to erect with minimal or no propping is required; allowing access by followon trades.

Sarah Bachmann National Precast Concrete Association Australia

FEATURE PRODUCT SHOWCASE TEXTURAL GLASS - THE IMPRESS RANGE

Product Description Cydonia the Glass Studio is the leader when it comes to architectural art glass and with this new range of textural glass, incorporating tight lines and precise repetition of pattern, we are world first.

With simple sleek designs, our Impress range of textural glass is able to fit into just about any glass application, keeping a modern look that won’t date.

The Impress range of textures was five years in the making and has had an extra two years since in production.

Proudly Australian owned and made, Cydonia’s textural glass has been exported all over the world.

Product Applications and Features • Cydonia’s Impress range of textural glass incorporates cutting edge technology in glass that has never before been able to be produced.

• The Impress range of textural glass features tight and accurate design that is easily able to be customised to suit your needs.

• Can be used for just about any application where you would use normal, flat glass, however without the need for constant cleaning.

• Without the need for constant cleaning, Cydonia’s Impress range of textural glass is low maintenance and more eco-friendly.

• Gives you privacy while still allows light to be transmitted through.

• Able to be used in commercial and residential spaces.

• For strength and safety, the glass is toughened to Australian Standards and is able to be made using 6mm, 10mm and 12mm thicknesses of glass in a variety of colours.

• Able to be double glazed.

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Easy ways to request additional information on this product

1) Online: awardmagazine.com.au/productdirectory 2) Fax: completed address card at the front of the magazine. | 45

FEATURED PRODUCT SHOWCASE AUTOMATIC DOOR OPERATORS

01 Series Automatic Door Operators For over four decades DORMA Automatics Pty Ltd has been manufacturing and supplying the highest quality automatic door operators in the Australian market.

Using next generation technology, the 01 Series Automatic Sliding Door Operator delivers infinite control, smoother function and sleeker lines, providing design possibilities that are limited only by the imagination. DORMA’s tradition of reliability, longevity, performance and safety continues to influence its’ product development. The 01 Series is an Australian made product developed specifically for our extreme climatic conditions - from winter frost, through to dry, arid summers.

Auburn Hospital, NSW Product Benefits The 01 Series is a high torque, superior performance product, developed to withstand heavy-duty use. It’s powered by DORMA’s purpose designed and built motor and gearbox that is supported by a 10 year warranty (when serviced in accordance with AS5007). The 01 Series electric motor lock locks the doors via the drive train regardless of the position of the door and operates in a failsafe manner compliant with the BCA section D2.21. The locking system incorporates a rechargeable battery reserve to ensure the doors remain locked for up to 20 hours under mains power failure.

Taking into consideration feedback from architects and designers, the 01 Series offers an external appearance with lines that are less harsh and obtrusive, allowing it to gently integrate with its environment.

A low profile option is also available, as a variation to the standard operator, enabling it to fit in to spaces where operator height is limited and performance requirements are high.

Sydney Airport, NSW Flexible Applications The 01 Series has the flexibility to be used with framed, frameless and solid core doors and forms the platform for the following automatic door operator models: • AL401 _ Heavy duty deluxe model, delivering superior performance and longevity capable of moving door weights up to 650kg.

• Ezy-fit EL301 _ Fully compliant to AS5007 and the benchmark for Australian automatic door operators.

• Bi Slide _ Telescopic doors that make the most of available space.

• Break out _ Automatic sliding doors that break out are ideal for places that require the movement of large numbers of people in emergency situations, such as places of public entertainment and shopping centers. The break out function can also provide a means to maximize the available entrance space for the movement of goods and equipment in and out of a building.

Gallery of Modern Art, QLD

• Power Train _ The flexibility to automate manual sliding door systems, Cool Room doors or upgrade existing automatic door operators.

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Easy ways to request additional information on this product

1) Online: awardmagazine.com.au/productdirectory 2) Fax: completed address card at the front of the magazine.

46 | www.awardmagazine.com.au

FROM DESIGN TO

CONSTRUCTION

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