This £31 million project for Leeds City Council has increased the resilience of the Leeds Inner Ring Road, helped reduce traffic in the city centre and will support ongoing business growth and new investment in the area.
As the first part of the Bishopgate Street, Armley Gyratory, Regent Street and City Square (BARC) programme of works, the dated and deteriorating Regent Street Flyover was demolished and replaced with a new structure with an expected lifespan of 120 years.
Collaborating for success
From the early stages of project development, we worked closely with Leeds City Council and our supply chain partners via the SCAPE Civil Engineering framework to develop plans for how we would deliver the works.
This early involvement helped us to identify value engineering opportunities that included reusing some of the existing piles and pile caps, saving £1.5 million. It also allowed us to plan works in a way that minimised disruption for motorists by only having road closures at off-peak times and keeping two of the A64’s four lanes open at all other times, resulting in no significant traffic delays due to our works.
The planning works undertaken at this stage were also crucial to the project diverting 99.67% of waste from landfill, including recycling the demolition arisings.
Digital first delivery
To help ensure the safe and smooth delivery of the project, we utilised a range of digital tools to improve project delivery, including:
- Laser scanning the existing structures to help us to produce designs that could be efficiently constructed
project value
local people employed
hours of volunteering work
- Using AutoCAD to make sure that all bridge beam deliveries and self-propelled modular transporter and crane movements around site were completed safely and efficiently
- Using a 4D animation to bring the project to life and explain the works to both internal and external stakeholders, including as part of site inductions and safety briefings
- Monitoring pressures exerted on concrete formwork in real time to ensure high quality finishes were achieved and to help us to minimise disruption by completing concrete works in shorter timeframes
- Providing Leeds City Council with a high-quality Building Information Model of the project to assist with future maintenance works
Creating a positive, lasting legacy
Maximising the social value created in the local community was a priority from the outset. As well as employing a number of graduates and apprentices across the project, we rolled out a virtual work experience programme for students across the country. Supporting NOVUS, a social enterprise providing education in prisons, we converted the content of our virtual work experience programme into presentations that are now being used to showcase the opportunities in the construction sector to young offenders.