Acies helped to deliver an outstanding leisure centre to serve the community of Hackney.

Acting as temporary works designer for Morgan Sindall on the construction of a new leisure centre and secondary school in London, as well as the demolition of a leisure centre on the same site. The initial involvement consisted of designing temporary works for the Leisure Centre, allowing it to stay operational during construction.

This included reconfiguring an existing public sewer access shaft to accommodate the new foundation. Acies, also provided foundation designs for a temporary storage and accommodation block to support ongoing projects throughout the construction period.

Following the enabling works and site setup phases, the temporary works for the Leisure Centre project focused on designing a working platform around the perimeter of the proposed building. This platform facilitated the use of mobile cranes at various stages of construction. Additionally, a foundation was designed for a trestle to assist with the installation of the large steel roof trusses.

The project also required design checks on two-pile tower crane bases, as well as access scaffolds within the double and triple-height spaces surrounding the indoor swimming pool. Furthermore, careful planning was involved in utilizing areas of the suspended slab within the building for cladding installation, ensuring safety and efficiency throughout the construction process.

Project Challenges 

For the new secondary school project, key aspects of the temporary works included the erection of two tower cranes, sheet piling for the basement construction, and the installation of a goods hoist.

Due to the proposed route of Crossrail 2 running directly beneath the building footprint, traditional piling for the tower crane bases was not feasible. Instead, the principal structural engineer for the permanent works integrated the support for the tower cranes into the raft foundation design. However, this approach required the complete construction of the raft foundation before the cranes could be erected.

An innovative design solution was also necessary for the goods hoist foundation. The hoist was to be positioned on the pavement adjacent to a main road and at the top of a new basement retaining wall for the secondary school, demanding a carefully considered foundation to ensure stability and safety.

ACIES solutions

We developed a design for standalone raft foundations for each tower crane to allow them to be erected while works on the rest of the foundations were still being carried out. These bases were then incorporated into the design of the permanent raft foundation to avoid breaking them out at a later date.

To distribute the loads from the goods hoist, loads at the base of the hoist needed to be suitably distributed over a reinforced concrete raft foundation to avoid excessive surcharge being imposed on either the retaining wall or the numerous services underneath the pavement. Our engineers designed a raft for the constrained location, which avoided both the services and applying loads to the retaining wall.

“I am so proud that we have delivered one of London’s best leisure centres, with absolutely incredible facilities that are affordable for people to enjoy.” Philip Glanville, Mayor of Hackney (2016–2023).