SINGAPORE - Building entire hostel rooms in a factory before stacking them like building blocks on-site was one of the time-saving construction methods that architectural and engineering consultancy P&T Consultants was recognised for in this year's Construction Productivity Awards.
It was one of four firms to receive the Construction Productivity Award in the Advocate category, announced yesterday by the Building and Construction Authority (BCA). In the Project category, eleven building projects were also recognised for their use of productive technology.
P&T Consultants won Gold awards in both the Consultant Category (Architectural) and Consultant Category (Civil and Structural), for pioneering technologies such as prefabricated pre-finished volumetric construction.
In this system, entire rooms are built in a factory, complete with fittings such as tiled floors, before being assembled on the construction site. Compared to conventional methods, this uses 25 to 40 per cent less manpower and takes 15 to 20 per cent less time. The method is being used to build the new student hostel at Nanyang Technological University's North Hill precinct.
Also receiving a Gold award, in the Builder open category, was local construction firm Unison Construction, which developed six types of prefabricated bathrooms with different wall materials.
Merit winners in the Advocates category were Davis Langdon KPK (Singapore) and Soil-Build.
In the Projects category, the highest accolade - the Platinum award - was given to three residential projects by City Developments Limited: Tree House Condominium, Cube 8 and 368 Thomson. The projects had designs that were easy to build and made extensive use of precast and prefabricated components, including parts of the 24-storey vertical green wall of plants at Tree House Condominium.
Winning Gold awards were three Housing Board projects, commercial buildings such as The Metropolis and Asia Square Tower 2, industrial building Edward Boustead Centre, the redevelopment of Specialists' Centre and Hotel Phoenix, and improvement works to the Geylang River from Dunman Road to Guillemard Road.
BCA chief executive officer Dr John Keung said that to raise productivity, the construction process must change to resemble manufacturing, with more prefabrication of components that are then assembled on-site.
"This year's winners show that the industry is moving in this direction and I encourage more firms to adopt a mindset change towards higher productivity as it ensures their long-term sustainability and competitiveness," he added.
The winners will be receiving their awards during the BCA Awards ceremony on May 14 May at Resorts World Sentosa.
