Building the Future

ZUIDAS ACQUIRES AN 86-METRE HIGH WOODEN TOWER

Zuidas acquires another eyecatcher. Under the authority of listed commercial property investor NSI, Dam & Partners Architecten designed an 86-metre high office building, one of the highest wooden office buildings in the world.

LOCATION The building will be located at what will soon become a very prominent location: at the end of the new Maurice Ravellaan, for which the first activities have already taken off and along which the new residential district Ravel will be built. The lane extends from the Gustav Mahlerlaan. Hence, soon the wooden tower can be seen from the Parnassusweg. A sight line that urban planners are already feasting on, also thanks to the inclined surfaces at the top and bottom of the building.

BRING TO LIFE The plot on which the tower will be built now consists of a grass pitch and a pedestrian access to the underground car park, meant for users of the adjacent building. ‘Together with Dam & Partners we tried to give substance to this location, in line with Zuidas’, says Sten Karelse, Head of Development at NSI. ‘The entire area east of the Antonio Vivaldistraat is under

development, especially with the arrival of EMA and the Van der Valk hotel. We are keen to help bring this area to life.’

SUSTAINABLE AND HEALTHY BUILDING In all aspects, this will be a sustainable building. The building technique is sustainable, the materials are sustainable and optimally reusable. The ambition is, therefore, to obtain the highest sustainability certificate BREEAM-NL Outstanding. It should also become a healthy building for the people who work there. ‘We pay ample attention to the indoor climate – which was not a priority in many offices. For the interior we do not use materials that give rise to toxicity. This comfortable work climate contributes to the wellbeing of the users. The top of the building will have a roof terrace with trees and other greenery. The natural and inspiring environment combined with our services ensures that they can work as productively as possible. This is in keeping with the changing need of users, which centres on space-as-aservice. We are well aware of the challenges on the market in the short term. However, we still believe that in the long term the demand for modern, comfortable, sustainable offices, in Zuidas especially, will remain. With a foreseen start of construction in 2022, we have time to evaluate in what way the economy, the offices market, and the user demand evolve in the time to come.’

PUBLIC AREAS The wooden building will have a gross floor surface of 22,000 square metres – by default, the floors will have a gross floor surface of approximately 1,100 square metres, but the ground floor will be smaller. Between 500 and 3,200 square metres of the floor surface will consist of publicly accessible areas. ‘The bottom layers will have public facilities and flexible workplaces. The idea behind the design is that the public space outdoors and the public areas indoors complement each other. That is why we reduced the footprint a bit more compared to the floors above it. An identically inclined surface can be found at the top of the building, with which we give it its specific character.’ The definitive design is expected to become available in the second quarter of 2021.

Zuidasdok builds work island between the tracks

We are in the process of preparing the construction of two roof sections for the additional entrance to Amsterdam Zuid station. The work will be done between two metro tracks.

From the location of the work, it’s difficult to imagine that there will soon be two sheets of concrete 70 m long, 6 m wide and 2 m thick. In order to be able to build two roof sections simultaneously on the work island, the ZuidPlus construction consortium, which is carrying out the work, had to come up with an ingenious idea. This is because there is no room for two work sites next to each other. The solution: the first sheet of concrete will soon become the work site for the second sheet. Vergouw: ‘In October 2020, we will start work on the roof section that will be beneath metro track 1. When that is completed, it will be covered by a protective layer of sand and become the work site where we’ll build the second roof section.’ This second section will be beneath railway track 4. So, when both are completed, we’ll push them southwards.

BUILDING IN THE FINAL LOCATION In early November 2019, we inserted the first roof section of the additional passenger tunnel, the Brittenpassage, into position. This work was done from Arnold Schönberglaan. The roof had to be lifted diagonally across the A10 and the railway tracks. The roof of the Brittenpassage will consist of a total of seven sections. We’re building as close

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as possible to the final location. For the two roof sections that we’re now building between the metro tracks, the advantage is that they don’t need to be taken across the A10 to be inserted. Of course, the disadvantage is the limited space. But that applies to nearly all aspects of the Zuidasdok project.

AUGUST 2021 If everything runs smoothly, there will be one roof section of the Brittenpassage beneath railway track 4 and one beneath metro track 1 by the morning of Monday, 23 August 2021. By then, three sections of the roof of the Brittenpassage will be in position, with another four to go.