Luton Airport car park

The challenge: from disaster to opportunity

Extensive assessments after the fire showed that the structure of the car park had deteriorated to the point where it was no longer safe or fit for purpose. Floor slabs and supporting beams had collapsed, while the structural steelwork was buckled and weakened. The only realistic solution was to take the whole car park down to ground level and start again from that point.

The car park is only six meters from the airside boundary and a few minutes’ walk from the terminal building. The busy airport ring road runs close by, so the BAM team had to carry out construction work against a constantly moving backdrop of live operations.

Key activities – such as the operation to lift the new steel superstructure into place – had to be carried out safely, close to the road and the public realm.

But the pressure was on to deliver quickly. And at the same time, the rebuild had to meet the complex requirements of a highly technical £100m insurance claim.

The BAM solution: flexible and pragmatic teamwork

The BAM team successfully managed a series of complicated challenges, including minimising disruption to the 750-1,000 vehicle movements every day on the ring road next to the site, dealing with unidentified service runs and working in confined spaces.

The damaged car park had been carefully demolishing, so a whole new structure could be constructed above ground. The plan was to reuse the foundations, partly to minimise the timeline for the build. 

Working with MNP – the structural engineers on the project – BAM’s ground engineering experts[AH2.1] tackled some significant issues with the retained foundations. They carried out rigorous testing of the original piles and caps to determine how far these might have been damaged during the fire and subsequent demolition process.
The investigations showed that the original foundations needed to be reinforced by adding extra piles and strengthening the existing sub-structure to accommodate the new building, with its enlarged stair cores and new lift shafts. 

Once these structural questions had been resolved, BAM’s biggest challenge was to deliver the new car park fast, to minimise disruption to passengers and get the airport fully up and running again.

The key to this was collaboration and a ‘can do’ attitude.

Close liaison with the client, supply chain and other stakeholders was crucial throughout the project, especially when it came to arranging deliveries and organising activities around the airport’s operational needs.

The result: improved infrastructure for a better passenger experience

The new steel-framed structure – with its pre-cast concrete cores and composite floor – was delivered against extremely tight timescales, opening less than two years after the devastating fire.

This wasn’t just a question of replacing like with like. The project delivered some major infrastructure upgrades including a sprinkler system (not a feature of the old car park), better drainage capable of storing 160,000 litres of sprinkler discharge[BC3.1] and a provision for a back-up generator to minimise operational risk.

The decks have been surfaced with high-performance weatherproof coating and a new, more convenient drop-off zone has been created on the ground floor.

Despite the time pressures and technical challenges on the project, BAM was also able to offer substantive work experience to several local young people. Level 3 civil engineering students from Barnfield College worked alongside BAM professionals on the project – including engineers, planners, estimators and health and safety advisors – to explore and learn a range of key construction skills. 

The project is great example of collaboration, technical expertise and determination to meet a challenging brief with extremely tight timescale.