Piling experts at Kvaerner Cementation Foundations have returned from New York triumphant after being awarded one of the world’s most prestigious foundations awards. The company has won the Deep Foundations Institute’s (DFI) Outstanding Project of the Year award for the deep piled basement and access shaft it constructed in central London for Harrods.
A seven-storey basement was built below the former site of Knightsbridge Crown Court, adjacent to Harrods, which the store is redeveloping to provide extra storage and office space, along with a 23-metre deep access shaft constructed below the store. It was named as the outstanding project ahead of a field of 15 foundations contracts from all over the world, with the DFI’s judges awarding Kvaerner Cementation Foundations’ project a record score of 98 per cent.
The company developed its own computer-based monitoring system for the project to ensure that movements in the ground and in the numerous high quality buildings which surround the site could be monitored in real time. This allowed the team to act immediately to movements greater than predicted while construction of the deep basement’s ground retaining diaphragm wall, large diameter piling and mini piling and access shaft with a connecting tunnel was underway.
The award was presented to Kvaerner Cementation Foundations’ project manager Martin Kenwright at the DFI’s bi-annual, European Federation of Foundations Contractors supported, International Conference in New York.
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