Chapter 15
Case study 1: Opus Business Park
DESCRIPTION OF THE PROJECT
Opus Business Park is a 14,500 m2 office building in eastern Helsinki. The general contractor of the project, NCC Construction Ltd, is one of the largest Nordic construction firms. The Finnish subsidiary of the company uses LBMS in all its projects. Before this case study, the emphasis had been on implementing the planning components of the system. Opus was its first case study for the location-based controlling system and also incorporated location-based contracts. The developer of the project was part of NCC Construction, and thus an internal client. This meant that time to market was important—earlier completion would provide earlier rental income. A normal contract was signed between the construction and the property development organisations. It was a target price contract with a guaranteed maximum price.
Figure 15.1 Opus 3: Opus Business Park—composite image
Opus 3, commenced in 2004, is the second part of a development of three office buildings. The first part, Opus 2 had already been completed in 2002. The Opus 3 project comprised two sections, arranged in a ‘V’ and which could be built independently of each other (a section is shown in Figure 15.1), and a parking hall below the main building. The structure was precast concrete. Identical office sections were connected by a diagonal corridor area with a glass façade (Figure 15.2). This diagonal area was built together with the second section. Both office sections had six floors. There were mechanical rooms on the roof of each section. Because the offices had not yet been rented at the start of the project and because companies have varying space requirements, the fit-out design incorporated flexible walls which could be moved within certain tolerances. The ground floor had special spaces, such as an auditorium, a dentists clinic with special requirements, and a lobby. Other floors were more or less repetitive construction although floor area reduced on higher floors and the top floor had a sauna section (almost a mandatory requirement in Finland).
Figure 15.2 Opus 3: Opus Business Park—joining corridor façade
AVAILABLE STARTING DATA
NCC Construction Ltd was the first company to implement location-based management systems widely in its organisation. For two years before this project it had been familiar with the required starting data. In this project, accurate location-based quantities, based on the project’s location breakdown structure, were available very early on to support the planning process. Quantities were available for both the construction and MEP trades. However, MEP quantities were rough estimates based on project characteristics and s...