The £16m new roof that will form part of Manchester Victoria Railway Station’s £44m re-vamp, will also feature a special piece of engineering designed at HBPW’s Retford offices.
The station, which is being transformed into a ‘transport interchange’ as part of Network Rail’s plans to create a premier gateway to the city that is safer, brighter and more spacious, will also feature a Grand Designs style roof made from ethylene tetrafluoroethylene, or ETFE.
ETFE was used at Piccadilly station, the Eden Project in Cornwall and the swimming pool built for the Beijing Olympics, known as the Water Cube.
HBPW Partner, Emyr Parry, said: “We have played a minor part in the entire project but a very important one because we were asked to design a series of small enclosures that form the wall elevation to the new station. The enclosures have also been designed to sustain terrorist blast loading to British Transport Police requirements so that passengers would be protected in the event of an attack.”
The enclosures will be used to house the mechanical equipment that is subsequently used to ‘inflate’ the state-of-the-art roof.”
ETFE is lighter, cheaper and lets in more light than glass. It’s also self cleaning, making it an ideal material.
“Many consider it the building material of the future because this so-called ‘wonder polymer’, essentially a transparent plastic related to Teflon, is replacing glass and plastic in some of the most innovative buildings being designed and constructed today. It is nice to think that we have played our part in such an amazing project.”
The £44m project, which will also feature an improved concourse, including a new bridge link to the Manchester Arena, is scheduled to complete early next year.