In June 2012 MTX were awarded the contract to deliver a new £2,200,000 state of the art modular Mortuary Facility at Ysbyty Glan Clwyd in North Wales.
Working for main contractor Laing O’Rourke MTX have, over the last 12 months, successfully been awarded a number of projects for Ysbyty Glan Clwyd all of which form part of the Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board’s £90 million refurbishment and remodeling project expected to be completed by 2018.
The £90 million project, initiated by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) was primarily put in place to remove asbestos from the Glan Clwyd Hospital site. However, getting the go-ahead and funding to remove the asbestos meant that they could also take the opportunity to refurbish many key parts of the hospital including the operating theatres, mortuary facility, Pathology Department and Accident and Emergency department to deliver a world-class facility for staff, patients and the public it serves.
State of the art Mortuary Department
MTX were contracted to design and build a new stand-alone, 550m2 modular mortuary facility and commenced work on site in June 2012. The building project, expected to be delivered over a 28-week on-site construction programme, was actually handed over to the Trust earlier than planned at the beginning December 2012 and came in well within budget.
The new modern facility contains a post mortem room, body fridges, offices, changing rooms, viewing room and observation area, all of which are serviced by a dedicated plant room located on the first floor.
An attractive building, the new mortuary facility is externally finished with bespoke coloured spandrel panels and a Kingspan micro-ribbed cladding system providing a clinical, modern look whilst remaining sympathetic with the buildings purpose. The building also features a louvered screen wall along the first floor roofline with a matching Kingspan parapet that effectively hides the external plant area without screening it off entirely. The building installation has been built to BREEAM ‘very good’ rating, a pre-requisite of the Trust for all of their new buildings. In addition Solar PV Panels have been installed on the roof of the modular facility to help serve some of the departments energy requirements.
Talking of the completed installation, MTX Project Manager Scott McCaskie says, “We always enjoy working with Laing O’Rourke and this job was no exception. The project team worked really well together and the Trust was very proactive in ensuring that any issues were ironed out easily and without delay. The building, situated on a green belt site at the rear of the hospital grounds, was highly specified internally and externally. All these elements combined to make this project very rewarding when reflecting on the teams achievements”.
Customer Feedback
Both Laing O’Rourke and the Hospital Trust are delighted with the new Mortuary Department and are impressed by the time scale in which it was delivered. The building has received excellent feedback from end-users and has been complimented on its attractive external appearance.
Local Building Control have also recognised the quality and finish of the new building by awarding it ‘winner of the Denbighshire County Council Building Control Building Excellence Award 2013 in the Best Healthcare/Community project category’ and have consequently nominated the building for the prestigious National Award for ‘North Wales Building Excellence 2013’ which will be announced later on this year.
Project Planner for Laing O’Rourke, Michael Smethurst commented on the completed project “Having worked with MTX upon this particularly complex and challenging modular building from scheme conception through to completion, all credit must be awarded to MTX and their award winning site team for ensuring that all planning, delivery and co-ordination aspects of the scheme went seamlessly. Given the additional constraints of completing this scheme within a challenging programme, to a fixed budget and within a live hospital environment, is further evidence that MTX are a company securely placed to complete challenging and demanding healthcare projects.”