Images courtesy of Foster + Partners
Images courtesy of Foster + Partners
AMAALA Airfield is designed to be the key transportation hub for the whole AMAALA Development. Taking inspiration from its dramatic desert environment, the airport will welcome all incoming and outgoing guests travelling by plane. The airport will reflect AMAALA’s ultra-luxury hospitality spirit, providing an exclusive private-club experience perfectly encapsulating AMAALA’s pillars of art and culture; wellness and sport; and sea, sun, and lifestyle. The project includes climate control hangers for private aircrafts, a number of lounges and conference rooms. Additionally, there is a broad spectre of auxiliary buildings which will allow top of the class services to be provided.
Initially, Robert Bird Group were appointed to develop concept Construction Methodology and Erection Sequence (CMES) for the airfield. This was soon followed by demand to prepare packages for Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) Process. The key advantage of this approach, is to bring constructability to the front end of the project. Once this process has taken place, RBG will be working alongside a number of short-listed contractors, to fully develop the construction method. RBG’s main aim was to develop project wide modularization to the structure and facade system which would facilitate safe, quality control and time and cost-efficient construction methods. While the concept CMES was prepared, RBG identified a number of the value engineering opportunities in the current design. After being instructed by the Client, RBG undertook an extensive Value Engineering study, which ended up halving the amount of structural steelwork on the project and estimated a saving of approximately 30m SAR.
Sustainability
- Robert Bird Group’s approach to transfer as much of the construction process as possible into quality-controlled factory and pre-assembly yard environments reduced the amount of work on site. As a result, potential environmental impacts were reduced.
- Robert Bird Group also facilitated the choice of a more natural material, such as stainless steel as opposed to composite plastics for the cladding system.
Value Add
AMAALA Airfield is the first project in the MENA region where an early CMES approach was implemented. RBG were able to showcase the broad spectrum of benefits of adding this method to the project, which was recognised by the Architect, Foster + Partners. An immediate collaboration was established, which lead to positive effect on the development of the architectural design.
In such a collaborative environment, RBG were able to do a detailed assessment of the efficacy of the existing structural design and incorporate a number of adjustments that lead to significant savings. All of this added significant value to the design process and also to the development of the project cost plan.
Project Metrics
Building Metrics:
Main Terminal
ATC tower and 8 auxiliary buildings
Sectors:
Aviation
Client:
AMAALA
Project Metrics
Environmental Metrics:
AMAALA Airport is part of a larger development framework target to meet net zero carbon operations
Leed4.1 Gold Rating
Architect:
Foster + Partners, Egis
Robert Bird Group Services:
Concept CMES Development, Early Contractor Involvement Process facilitation and Value Engineering