This vast project encompasses the sensitive refurbishment of 20 historic buildings, which includes: building a four-storey basement just 6m above the Elizabeth line; twice moving a listed building; and supporting the 2000m2 of display screens accessible by the 200,000 daily users of Tottenham Court Road Station. This was achieved by listening to the stakeholders’ needs and concerns; challenging conventions; assessing options with first principles engineering; using innovative construction techniques; accepting ideas and precedents from the industry and using the latest analysis tools to refine solutions.
The project team demonstrated a commitment to revitalising and sensitively restoring a historic London site. They overcame very difficult conditions in the below ground works, constrained by infrastructure tunnels. The design responds well to very significant construction challenges on a congested site.
This complex project also facilitated a quicker and safer construction of part of the Tottenham Court Road Station upgrade. A deep basement was constructed above Crossrail using top-down construction to ensure stringent movement criteria could be met.
The team worked collaboratively to develop innovative piling solutions, including 68m sleeved pile to prevent surcharging the surrounding tunnels. The use of live movement data, as well as learning from other projects, was demonstrated to save cost and carbon in the construction process.