Construction World February 2016

PROJECT PROFILE

the demand for the safety officers, safety representatives, scaffold supervisors, erectors and inspectors. The labour force employed on site peaked in March 2015 with over 1 800 people on site. Risks The Horizon development includes the upgrading of the roadway which currently will be inadequate to handle the expected drastic increase in traffic in the vicinity around devel- opment. The increase in road width will result in the loss of pavement width which in turn will result in many trees being lost. Some are being replanted inside the new landscaped areas, but unfortunately not all. Social impact consideration A contract of this nature requires a vast amount of skilled labour resources which are in particular short supply in Mozambique. To deal with the high demand of steel fixers, bricklayers and plasterers, SS Construções employed and trained hundreds of new employees in these trades. These people had to be trained to meet the demands of this contract and its tight schedule. The existing training facilities in the contractor’s plant yard had to be increased significantly to cope with the numbers required to be put through the SS Construções in-house training programmes. On successful completion of their training, they were deployed to site for further on-the-job training and integration with existing teams. During 2015, SS Construçoes embarked on social upliftment projects for the commu- nity in the Zimpeto neighbourhood. It rebuilt a dilapidated building and turned it into a pre-primary school which houses 65 very appreciative children. The second project entails the construc- tion of a sports field with change rooms, public ablutions and a spectator stand. It will also boast with one of the very few fully grassed soccer pitches in Maputo. Surrounding this field, the contractor will transplant the trees that had been displaced by the Horizon development. Block manufacturing plant The project specification for the masonry walls is based on the use of concrete blocks. The local block manufacturing enterprises are not as formal as those in RSA. Open air manu- facture, no quality assurance processes and limited curing all lead to poor quality blocks being the norm. This coupled with the very high demand for blocks throughout the wet works phase of the project, necessitated SS Construçoes to set up its own block manufacturing plant. This plant, with 12 full time employees, trained to operate it, has successfully serviced the high demand Horizon project and has since supplied a number of the contractor’s other contracts with quality blocks and will continue doing so into the future.

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The towers in detail The apartment tower consists of 17 floors with 11 apartments per floor. These are made up of a three thee bedroom units, three two bedroom units, three one bedroom units and four studio apartments. The 20 th and 21 st floor levels are dedicated to six double-storey penthouse apartments. The office tower floors are open plan with ablutions, kitchenette and service rooms on each floor. The SS Construçoes in-house carpentry department manufactured and installed all the doors, door frames and some joinery elements in this tower. The central AC plant which will keep every square metre of the building cool in the hot tropical local weather conditions is located in the middle of the podium. Three MV standby diesel generators provide standby power to protect the building from the periodical power outages. The building also boasts a 100% coverage sprinkler system not common in Mozam- bique. Due to the size, complexity and tight programme, dual specialist subcontractors had to be contracted for the same trades. Plumbing, tiling and painting packages were all too large for one contractor to deal

with which necessitated this approach. Mozambique does not have formal sewer treatment works systems and hence the Horizon has a large on-site sewer treatment plant which treats the effluent. Once treated, the clean water is stored for use as top-up in the HVAC system’s cooling towers and for the irrigation of the landscaped areas. Intricate façades The façades on the project consists of a double glazed stick system and a flush glazed unitised system which are very complex due to the curved shapes and varying applications required to different parts of the building. The design of the interfaces with the concrete structure took months to conclude. Everything was then pre-made in Portugal and shipped to Mozambique for installation. Thereafter the concrete balustrades were decorated with a Gamma Zenith render application which finishes the impressive looking façades. The public areas on the podium level consist of a cocktail bar, outside entertain- ment areas and two swimming pools, beauti- fully finished off with tropical palm trees and lush landscaping.

CONSTRUCTION WORLD FEBRUARY 2016