Name: Jason Wooldridge
Employer: Wates Construction
Project: Sunrise Senior Living Bagshot
Contract: JCT 2005
Once a project template has been forged and tested, it should, in theory anyway, be a reasonably easy matter to keep the production line going. But in moving straight on to this project after building his second care home for the same client, Jason Wooldridge can vouch for the fact that there is no such thing as an easy life in construction management.
First, the early requests for statutory services disconnections were not actioned, so much of the demolition could not proceed. Aware that the client would not look favourably on any delay, Jason resequenced the works in the ground, planning the piling around the undemolished buildings to progress the substructure.
Pushing the foundation works as hard as possible, he then masterminded a drainage redesign. Sunrise surface attenuation schemes always employed a huge glassfibre storage tank, located here next to a 5m-high boundary wall and under the main site access road, just where the mobile craneage would be sited to help erect the building’s steel frame.
Jason’s proposal for storm cells instead eased the site logistics, eliminated the time-consuming temporary works, allowed greater loading levels and greatly reduced the safety risks. Likewise, he rationalised the foul drainage to reduce the number of penetrations and tricky interfaces with the underslab gas membrane, benefiting the programme and the budget.
He then bravely challenged the position of the marketing trailer and model rooms, which were crucial elements of the client’s sales campaign. Their original location required public access across the site, raising safety and logistics problems. Jason’s alternative suited site logistics and planning far better and further pleased the client by increasing the trailer’s visibility from the A30, ultimately resulting in the preletting of more rooms than anticipated.
Even the fittings and furnishings were different from what had gone before, with big changes to the communal areas in particular. The original intention had been to roll the new scheme out in the US, but suddenly Jason’s project became the trial site for the entire concept. It meant revisiting all the historic knowledge he had built up, bringing new suppliers and subcontractors into the construction team, developing the design, and ironing out all the integration and co-ordination issues. He managed the multiple challenges involved openly, quietly and efficiently, and successfully incorporated the new design.
Value: £12.2m