
Kier Construction
Somerset Diagnostics Centre
Somerset Diagnostics Centre: refurbishment of fire HQ as diagnostics centre, completed in 40 weeks.
Client: Rutherford Diagnostics
Contract: JCT 2016, design and build
Value: £4.6m
About the Project
Daryl Parker’s 40-week mad flurry of activity came in stark contrast to the 13 years this never used building had stood empty. Daryl had four weeks to mobilise and was on site six weeks after a tender interview he’d had two days’ notice for. Then mid-works on a challenging and ambitious programme, a two-weeks-early hand-over was requested.
Despite many stakeholders considering this to be unachievable, Daryl’s focused, clear-minded, logical and intelligent leadership delivered this major and complex scheme in the whistle-stop time-frame. He commissioned equipment and scheduled high-impact activities such as floor laying, ceiling closure and high-pressure pipe testing out of hours.
Even though good existing service information was unavailable before site start, he was able to contain the budget by identifying many reusable power, water, data, ventilation and drainage elements. He also identified credible and intelligent solutions for installing specialist services – medical gases, nurse call systems, AV equipment, uninterruptible and isolated power supplies, and chilled water for the MRI scanner – into the very small spaces of the existing building.
The risk was enormous. If the services weren’t ready for teams from Europe booked in to install the scanners on the scheduled date, it could delay becoming operational for up to six months. But Daryl aligned the re-engineering of the building to the installation of the client’s specialist equipment – x-ray, ultrasound, CT and MRI scanners – and hit that ‘impossible’ deadline.
