At a glance
Client/project partners: Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation Trust
Status: Complete
Location: Liverpool
Awards
BREEAM - Excellent
One of Europe’s biggest and busiest children’s hospitals, Liverpool’s Alder Hey in the Park provides care for more than 270,000 children every year, delivering world-class medical services in a comforting, inviting environment to help children recover.
Most bedrooms have natural views and access to the park. Play decks have been added to the wards, so that children who cannot leave the ward can also benefit from outdoor space. The facilities provide 270 beds, of which 75% are in single occupancy rooms with en suite. There are 16 state-of-the-art operating theatres.
The 270-bed hospital features open spaces in wards, en suite rooms with views of landscaped areas, a giant indoor treehouse, outdoor play decks with hydroponic fish tanks, a relaxation garden, interactive screens in patient waiting areas, and more.
Most importantly, it doesn’t look or feel like a hospital.
Our Approach
Digital engineering was used extensively in design and construction to allow clinicians to see how the building would look and function, and to enable project efficiencies.
The use of Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA) was crucial to speedy delivery, demanding timescales for the construction and procurement teams meant that the design process led the way as an efficient means of developing solutions to enable programme milestones. The programme not only demanded commencement of building services fit-out work just 20 weeks from financial close, the 44-week commissioning programme was also the fastest for a scheme of this scale. Modularisation was central to our delivery strategy.
Delivered 20% faster than any previous comparable project.
Added value to clients
CHt worked with the Trust and their technical advisers to design and deliver the most technically efficient solution to meet the needs of all key stakeholders, developing a model to accurately meter, measure, assess and record energy usage for the four main energy sources: water, gas, oil and electricity. The strategy also identified how we will measure consumption, which will allow comparison with our energy calculations.
The services strategy was based on a system designed to meet the range of contractual targets such as Gj/100m3, carbon, onsite electrical generation and site renewables. As a result, the solution includes the following mix of plant and subsequent systems: boilers, combined heat and power (CHP) gas and bio fuel, air source heat pumps, ground source heat pumps, absorption chillers, and air-cooled chillers.
“Our new Alder Hey in the Park has been designed to meet the expectations of patients who wanted to be looked after in a state-of-the-art facility that was fun, helped them recover quickly and most importantly didn’t look like a hospital.”
