Multi - Storey Car
Park
Architects Model
Construction of the Car
Park
With production rising it
was necessary at Longbridge to make use of the available land more
economically. A big portion of the land by 'Q' gate was used for
the storage and dispatching of vehicles. With CAB 2 coming on
stream with the 1100 production, the problem could only get worse.
So it was decided that a multi-storey car park was the only
answer.
The company needed it to be built in a very short space of time and
so the contract was given to Douglas using a new building process
developed by the South West Research Institute in Texas USA, which
was very suited to making multi-storey car parks. The system was
called the Lift Slab technique which was introduced in 1950 in the
United States
With this system it eliminated the needs for formwork, scaffolding
and mechanical hoists as the building goes higher and higher. The
first stage in the construction is the building of the pillars
initially not to the final height. As the floors are cast one on
top of another at ground level a solution is sprayed on them to
prevent them sticking together, this solution or ‘filling’, being
broken when the stacked slabs are lifed usually two at a
time.
At the top of every pillars is a jack which has a lifting capacity
of 65 tons., the total weight of two floors in this build was 700
tons. The first lift was made on the in Mid February. Although I
called it a jacking process, by means of hydraulic units at the top
of each column lift th slabs, their weight being taken by threaded
rods. When the worlds largest car park is complete it will have
eight floors along with a roof park, that will be able to houses
3,300 vehicles, and will have cost £550,000.
The top floor being 72 feet above ground and 722 feet above
sea-level. High-tensile steel bars play an essential part in the
strengthening of the concrete columns and floors and it is
estimated that the bars being used to reinforce the structure, if
placed end to end, would stretch from Longbridge to Aberdeen. the
columns up which the slabs have been slowly creeping and are also
cast on site, if laid end to end they would have reached to
Cadbury’s at Bournville.
Various stages of
construction
Foundations go in for the
main pillars (Note how low the Flight Shed
looks)
View from Lowhill
Lane
This building was not used
in later years, and it was decided to demolish it in 2001.
View from the road by 'Q'
gate