Higher Education

Winner Christopher Purchase, Willmott Dixon

Winner Mathew Friedmann MCIOB, Eric Wright Construction

Project: South Wales Police Learning Centre, Bridgend, South Wales: redevelopment of headquarters building as a learning centre, completed in 208 weeks Client: South Wales Police Contract: NEC option A Value: £49m

On a difficult brownfield site,

Chris Purchase scored the big victories in the ground. Pockets of contaminated land meant either removing 19,000 tonnes of subsoil or covering the pockets with a geomembrane and capping them. That was until Chris suggested a cheaper and easier alternative: sustainable reuse.

By planting more than 20,000 low-maintenance native trees, shrubs and bushes, he was able to have the land certified as a site of importance for nature conservation, allowing the soil to be remediated and retained.

Similarly, he eliminated a piling operation to deal with voids under one of the buildings. He excavated the fractured rock, crushed it and returned it as fill, along with crushed rubble from the demolition works. It saved the client £750,000 and advanced site start by two months.

Exploiting his extensive experience of heavy civil engineering works,

GOLD

Chris developed a cut solution to create construction plateaus in ground that was extremely dry in summer but awash with springs during the winter rains.

His drainage solution of trenches with perforated pipes at the base of the escarpments and gabions planted with sedums along them saved time and money.

Other finalists

Paul Barrowcliffe MCIOB

Sir Robert McAlpine, Henry Daysh Building, Newcastle

Kevin O’Brien

Galliford Try, University of Birmingham

Christian Parton MCIOB

BAM Construction, Centre for Student Life, Cardiff

Martin Roberts

Willmott Dixon, Brunel Building, Bristol

Paul Southgate

Willmott Dixon Interiors, University of Westminster CSE, London W1

Project: Manchester Met Institute of Sport Scope: Construction of research block, completed in 68 weeks Client: Manchester Metropolitan University Contract: JCT, design and build Value: £14m

Repurposing this 1960s-built

student union as a turnkey stateof-the-art research facility required extensive refurbishment. Located a few feet from an elevated dual carriageway and involving large-scale demolition on a live campus, the risk was substantial. Matt Friedmann reduced that risk by retaining much of the existing structure.

The original plan was to demolish the masonry facade and replace it with a steel structure to support the new cladding. But after exhaustive testing and exploratory works, Matt fixed the support brackets directly to the existing masonry, giving the

SILVER

same appearance and performance for less cost, time and risk.

Matt’s leadership of this project was so effective that he finished 10 weeks ahead of programme – time he spent perfecting the finishes and thoroughly de-snagging.